Pesticides

Paolo Recanati <consob [at] imj__org__il> writes

>Objects on loan or donated to our Museum may arrive from abroad with
>hungry termites, with paper eating silverfishes or just with their
>eggs, potentially contaminating other "clean" items. As a preventive
>measure, every single object (containing any kind of organic
>material) that enters our Museum, must spend some time in a
>"quarantine" room. Soon after, it is treated in a special sealed
>room with some chemicals such as Permetrin (sort of smoke) or in a
>"bubble" with Methyl Bromide or Phosphin (the latter not on metals)
>that can kill also eggs.

Although I'm sure you can't compare the Jerusalem climate to the
Dutch circumstances  it sounds like you have used enough poison to
kill your direct enemies on the long term and have to be seriously
concerned about your own health and that of your colleagues and
visitors. There are already for a long time more human- and
environment-friendly solutions existing, like low-oxygen or
freezing, to treat your "new babies". I think you and your
collection are better of with an accurate pest-monitoring system to
make a picture of the collection's and the building's weakest spots
and attack them at the source.

Bart Greebe
Bruys meubel en interieurrestauratie
Amsterdam


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                  Conservation DistList Instance 16:34
                 Distributed: Friday, November 22, 2002
                       Message Id: cdl-16-34-010
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