SPECIALREPORT

Biting, chewing, scratching,gnawing and pecking critterscost utility companies and theircustomers throughout North

America millions of dollars every year.This article will delve into the problemas well as reveal some effective solutionsdiscovered by a Florida scientific researchcompany. The solution uses one of the

animal kingdom’s greatest strengthsagainst them to create an environmentallyfriendly, non-toxic deterrent that won’tharm the animals.

The ProblemAs long as there have been wooden

poles carrying communications andpower lines, the battle between man and

wildlife has raged on. Due to the fact thatour power and communications infra-structure is a national security concern,the government has even entered the frayby funding numerous studies to find ef-fective solutions. Icorp-Ifoam SpecialtyProducts Corporation has participated inand drawn from over 35 years of researchinto the problem. They were recently in-

Reprinted with permission from Utility Products • www.utilityproducts.com

The Utility/Wildlife Fray

By Bob Green

Reprinted with permission from Utility Products • www.utilityproducts.com

vited to participate with the U.S. Depart-ment of Agriculture in a joint study withutility companies. The study was focusedon the largest woodpecker in NorthAmerica, the pileated woodpecker.These birds are about a foot and a halflong and they create havoc on woodenutility poles. To highlight the problem,in a recent conversation with Jeff Combs,a line crew leader with the East KentuckyPower Cooperative, he stated, “We hadone pole with a hole so big that a raccoonwas (living) in it.” That type of damagecan weaken a pole to the point it will snapoff with the first good gust of wind.

Woodpeckers are a significant part ofnature’s ecosystem and the holes theymake in trees provide homes for manywoodland creatures. The first parameterin any viable solution would require pro-tection of the birds and the environment.In order to come up with a solution it isimportant to understand why the wood-pecker pecks. First of all, woodpeckersare constantly on the hunt for food. Theyuse their beaks as a type of sonar device.When they peck at the wood, they are lis-tening for any hollow places where in-sects might be making their home. Youmight not think that chemically preservedutility poles would have such voids, butwhen any wood dries, it shrinks andcracks and voids do occur internallyalong the tree’s ring lines. Hollow placesindicate a potential food source and that’sone of the main reasons these birds tearup the poles.

According to animal behavioral scien-tists, birds and animals alike have a senseof smell that can be as much as a thou-sand times more sensitive than humans.Icorp’s solution, IPOLE-WPD™, attacksthe birds’ sense of smell. The results ofone of the tests were pretty amazing.They put an untreated pole into a cagewith one pileated woodpecker for 10days. After that they removed the un-treated pole and replaced it with a poletreated with the IPOLE-WPD. The un-treated pole was nearly destroyed whilethe treated pole remained intact. Ac-cording to Phil Landers, president ofICORP, coming up with the odor wasonly a part of the solution. The harderpart was developing a process that wouldensure the odor would remain effectivefor many years. They recently received apatent on that process.

Keeping woodpeckers off the poles isimportant, but also important is a goodrepair and deterrent for poles that havealready sustained damage. Once againapplying their skills in science, Icorp hasdeveloped an expanding filler (expandingepoxy concrete) that does a number ofthings to restore the pole to its originalstrength. First, it expands to double itssize. As it expands, it heats up to tem-peratures greater than 300 degrees,thereby sterilizing any rot or decay in thehole. At that temperature, it becomes lessviscous than water and permeates throughany decay and into the good wood. Mostfillers only expand and attach to the de-cay, but the decay is not firmly attachedto the wood, therefore there is still inher-ent weakness at that location. When theIcorp product sets, it has attached itselfto the good wood fibers, filled the holeleaving no voids to encourage future at-tacks, is stronger than the wood itself andto prevent further attack, is permeatedwith the woodpecker resistant odor. Dueto the way that it is packaged, shelf life isindefinite (many years).

Since those tests Icorp has found theproduct to be an effective deterrent rang-ing from rodents to bears. Utilizing thesame odorants but with some minor mod-ifications in how the product is applied,

they developed a product labeled “Sniff‘n’ Stop”. In a recent conversation withEric McCollum of the Blue Ridge Elec-trical Coop in the northwest part of SouthCarolina, Mr. McCollum made the fol-lowing comment about squirrels, “As faras causes of outages, they are third on thelist,” with the other two causes beinglightning and trees. He also added, “Wedid an application (with the Sniff ‘n’Stop) on a service that was notorious forsquirrel damage. The squirrels wouldchew through everything - through theservice wire, entrance cable, neutrals,everything down to the steel.” He ex-plained how they applied the Icorp prod-uct to the problem areas and checked itthree weeks later. “There were no signsof any damage. I asked the customerwho lives there if he had noticed any-thing. He said ‘no’ and that the squirrelsare not even in the yard anymore. Hesaid ‘You’ve run ‘em off!’”

Icorp is constantly testing their prod-ucts on different applications to see whatanimals, birds and insects are affected bythe various odors. Of particular value Ibelieve is a small canister of the odorantthat can be opened and placed into vari-ous above-ground and underground en-closures. In a conversation with Mr.Landers the other day, he was highly en-couraged with a recent non-scientific testof the woodpecker odorant on fire ants.He described how he had taken one of thecanisters, removed the lid, and laid it onits side atop a fire ant hill. The fumes areheavier than air and he was curious to seehow the ants might respond. The nextday the entire colony was gone. This isobviously not to be construed as a scien-tific claim, but at the outset it is highlyencouraging.

Also, will it be effective against killerbees, snakes, black widow and brownrecluse spiders, etc.? These are all po-tentially deadly problems that line crewswould really like to see go away. If Icorpcan solve them with safe to handle, envi-ronmentally-friendly products it is myopinion they will be a very welcome sup-plier to the utility industry for a long timeto come. Once again, wherever utilitiesand wildlife collide, battles have raged.Wouldn’t it be nice to have a peaceful so-lution that would leave a healthier andsafer work environment with more reli-able utility services? o