Dry Rot & Brown Rot in Northern Colorado Crawl Spaces

Solving dry rot issues in Colorado

Damage from dry rot creates small, rectangular pieces of crumbling wood on the surface. Dry rot damage is often mistaken as a termite infestation.

Dry rot (also known as brown rot) is one of the most damaging forces on household wood in the world.

Approximately twenty billion feet of timber is destroyed by wood rot in the United States each year — that's more wood than that damaged by fire!

Replacement wood used to repair damage caused by wood rot accounts for almost 10 percent of the annual wood production in the United States alone.

In the United Kingdom, dry rot problems have been credited for dealing about 150 million pounds worth of damage annually, and wood rot in general leads to about 17 billion dollars of damage each year in the United States.

Colorado Crawl Space has a long history of experience in eliminating, preventing, and controlling dry rot infestations in homes throughout Colorado, including Eagle, New Castle, Meeker, Frisco, Granby, and areas nearby. If you have a dry rot problem in your home and would like more information, call or e-mail us today for a dry rot control estimate!

What is dry rot & brown rot?

"Dry rot" is a term most often used to describe a particular kind of dry, cracking, rotting wood. However, dry rot occurs because of a variety of brown rot species, most notably the "true" dry rot fungus known as Serpula lacrymans. Dry Rot originally got its name from the thought that it didn't need water to live, but instead used a fermentation process to survive. Research long ago proved that theory untrue, and dry rot is now more appropriately called "brown rot."

Dry rot needs much less moisture than other types of wood-rotting fungi — a wood moisture content of just 28-30% — to survive. While there is no official proof on the subject, many contractors have observed that dry rot also will not grow on wood with too much moisture.

Identifying & treating dry rot or brown rot problems in Colorado

Damage from dry rot creates small, rectangular pieces of crumbling wood on the surface. Dry rot damage is often mistaken as a termite infestation.

A common first indication of dry rot in a home is the appearance of a "red brick dust". This is actually an accumulation of fungal spores that are covering the surface, waiting for the proper conditions to start to grow.

An outbreak of dry rot commonly occurs several months after a household water event, such as flooding, bursting washing machine hoses, a failed water heater, or leaking pipes.

Dry rot is also common in vented crawl spaces with groundwater flooding.

Dry rot is often not detected until the damage is already very significant. At this point, the following steps are recommended:

Preventing dry rot problems in your crawl space

Colorado Crawl Space can help you eliminate dry rot problems at their source. We can dry your crawl space, eliminate flooding problems, and seal out humidity.

This not only eliminates dry rot problems, but also creates an environment that is inhospitable to:

We offer no-obligation crawl space quotes in our service area. We can answer all your questions and point out the sources of humidity and moisture in your home.

We proudly serve Colorado, including Vail, Aspen, Breckenridge, and nearby areas such as Steamboat Springs, Carbondale, Avon, Gunnison, Rifle, Salida, Bailey, and beyond.