Incidentally, this is the only 'on-topic' post in this subforum, but only in a very literal sense.

SO how to get rid of bookworms? My apartments should take the responsibility to spray but like with a lot of lower-income communities, they are not always timely about that.

Are they a pest that a regular spray will get rid of or can they be more problematic?

Do you mean Book Lice? It is against most pesticide license rules and laws to offer advice if not licensed (and across state lines). I can suggest a first tactic to use however. Take a couple of the books you think are infested in a sealed plastic bag to one of Texas' many well qualified Agriculture Experimental/Extension Stations. They are usually associated with colleges but sometimes not, so you have to do the footwork there to find them. They will exactly identify the type of insect you have and in many cases can offer solutions. More than likely you will need to fumigate, but I couldn't/shouldn't say which gas. (Sometimes Raid Insect bombs work but I didn't say that, I typed it) but you would most likely need to move the books off the shelves and expose as much of them to the gases as you can.

Edit to add: the seventh/eighth paragraphs discuss the booklice life cycle:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Book_lice

Well, luckily they're not parasitic on a human level. An associate of mine says they feed off the glue in the binding and I've never been bit by one. My cat smokes them out for me to kill. I hope it's not that bad mehaul. I live in an historic building. In my view, these things go with the territory. I've seen properties whose problem was roaches, others rodents, one I lived in recently even had caterpillars hang out on the property. God forbid if I brought these things in.

They might be moth larvae eating the books. I found that out the hard way.

Not moths, Mira. That's an inventive reply, but no moth problem here. These are certainly nasty parasites that like to hang out in my books. They're pretty disgusting. But, in my opinion, they have come in from an outside source. Their main hangout is not in my apartment. They are very small in number but they are resilient. I kill them when I find them but for the most part they stay out of sight. I truly hope this is not serious in the way bed bugs are. My lease agreement explicitly outlines a lines a scenario where you are obliged to contact management if bed bugs re suspected and you will be forced to leave, perhaps your neighbors as well, until the source and the solution is ascertained.

These louses though have to have taken up resident in the old infrastructure of the building. I doubt spraying my apartment would get rid of them because they are coming from another source. As long as they stay away from me! But I've been here over a year and a half and they've been here most of that time and they've never bothered me. But I want them out now.

A new colony is easier to be rid of than an established one. The reason is there in the wiki cited life cycle. The longer they've been around, the more often you have new generations hatching. You may have to eliminate 4, 5 or 5 successive generations to be totally rid of them. Note Bombs are not spaying. They are lethal gases that will penetrate nooks and crannies and take out specific life stages of target insects (flea bombs are probably the most familiar to people) and you must leave the premises for a few hours usually (follow directions to the letter). So you may need to vacate once a week for 4 weeks running while the gases are doing their stuff.
BUT, get that direction of warfare from the Extension Service. They may know things that are going on in your vicinity that you won't hear as gossip because people don't like to talk about their intimate environs publically. The Service agents are paid to get that info to you. They often have brochures that outline regimens to follow (which you can shelve and watch get eaten).
But also, the lice are indeed a close relative of the bed bug and may need drastic actions to remove them.

I looked over the article, I'm convinced from what I've seen that my problem is not the Psocoptera.

These beasts are much bigger than the 1-2 mm. In fact, they're more or less a centimeter and very narrow. They crawl across the floor, actually scurry, fairly fast. But not fast enough to outwit me. So compared to the psocoptera, these guys are big.

Lots of people on the internet saying to freeze the books. That's one of the ways to kill body lice in bedding, so seems reasonable.

Do they look like either of these?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Powder_post_beetle
or
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bostrichidae
?

Microwave the books for 15 seconds or deep freeze for 24 hours will kill all eggs and adults, so I hear

Mehaul, they actually look more like termites.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Termite

But they are very slender. The ones Ive looked at at your links are too fat or too wide and these bugs are white. But they're heads are not as fat as termites and they don't have the antennae and I think they're even thinner. They're really slender.

Ren, I will see if I can confirm that. I will also talk to my management and see if they can mark my apartment for spraying. Unfortunately, with eighty units, they only spray one-quarter or one-third at a time and either through accident or intent they did not spray my apartment almost all last year. So now with new management I think I will get a better response if I talk with her.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carpenter_ant

Don't be fooled by the big black one at the article lead in. About 3/4ths of the way down you'll see a whitish version. There are over a thousand types. The white ones I'm familiar with mate then the female starts to fly away but the minute she touches down, her wings come off and she must scurry about to find a place to lay eggs.
As I've said, the surest tactic is to have the varmits identified by an Entymologist at an Agricultural Extension Service/Station. Look them up in a phone book or online and ask them how to proceed. Don't microwave your books, many have gold silver or other metal gilding or have staples as a binding method. You'll either blow up your microwave or the metal will get hot enough to ignite the paper of the books (451 degrees). The freezer method might work but only if you have a drying chamber to put them in afterwards. Without that condensation will immediately form on every surface and page of the book, feeding any bacteria or fungi on the pages thus ruining the book.

Edit tactic. You might/should protect your valuable books by putting them into a ziplock baggie with a couple of flakes of naphtha (moth balls).

Very good mehaul. Where do you get all these facts from? Are you a student of creatures?

I actually talked to my apartment manager. She said termites as soon as I explained it to her. They hang out around the baseboards along the wall and are living somewhere inside, which could be other apartments, or other floors or yet to be seen they're origination point. But they've been here off and on the whole year and a half I've been here.

This is a five story historic building with wooden floors so I'm not surprised if they are termites.

So I started this thread because I suspected 'bookworms' and joked that this was the most on-topic thread on the bookworm subforum (wah wah). It turns out, this probably has nothing to do with louses but termites. Thank God, louses give me the creeps.

I've seen a lot of indication online that termites will bore into books, especially if the book is on a wooden shelf - they just sorta keep on going.

One thing to keep in mind - you mentioned you have a cat. Because the cat rolls around on the ground, brushes up against furniture, etc, it is likely to pick up toxins from the spray. Of course, the cat is also a lot smaller than you are, and a trace amount of toxin that won't hurt you can be dangerous to the cat. Wouldn't hurt, when the spraying happens, to have a little talk with your vet for ideas on how to protect your cat.

So I had my apartment sprayed yesterday late morning. I was asleep on the couch when they came in. I didn't even get up and he came and sprayed along the wall. I was zonked out. But I knew they had came in. And then they were very nice, when they left, they locked my door so I didn't have to get up. How kind!

I've only seen/had one bookworm ever, but it bored a pretty good hole in one of my books before I discovered it and killed it.

I knew termites would eat cardboard; I didn't know they would eat books.

Hello juys, I came to conclude they were termites. It's an old building with hardwood floors and very attractive for their ilk. They're gone, they were sprayed!

I hope no one minds if I bring the subject of insects back up.

A couple years back leading into summer, I saw quite a strange site.

A hole had opened in the ground and what appeared to be larvae coming out suddenly sprouted wings and took to flight. It was quite horrific in a very scientific sort of way.

Doe the previous amateur entomologist or somebody want to help me understand what I witnessed?

That would most likely have been a swarming event. Bees aren't the only insect that colonizes and spreads its seed by swarming.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swarm_behaviour

Here in South Florida the late spring is a time (warm air, moist with spring rains) when most of our ant types swarm. Particularly a nuisance are white footed ants and sugar ants. Their clouds drift on the breeze up to heights of 6 feet making them quite a problem for bicyclists. Fire ants would come out of the ground also but swarm in reduced numbers of new adults.
I have seen some nasty swarms back in New England, similar to what you described, from ground nesting yellow jacket wasps. The newly formed colonizing adults have yet to acquire their exoskeleton color and look white much like the larvae they were in their cells.
Again, your local agricultural experimental station or college entymology department would be more helpful to you than my missives.
On the East Coast a good home reference would be Peterson's Field guide to the Insects of North America. The Audubon Society also has an intensive photographic handbook to identify insect types by body form and colors. You must remember though that adult reproductive stages of most insects look very different than what the normal worker insect would look like.

Glad to hear the crawlers are gone from your floors. Do you know what chemical treatment they used? They should have given you some information about a chemical they applied to your living quarters, even if it was a short lived molecule. I believe that is (or was when I sprayed) a Federal requirement. Although that is often overlooked on repeat applications which it seems you've encountered in your apartment. If this was a repeat application, be vigilant. The chemical may not have gotten to pupae in the nests and the next generation will soon start but not be as evident as they were when you were noticing them before. Again, you should learn more from your local experts. Pesticide companies will usually freely divulge local insect activities.

Best word to use when I think about it, is gnats. These seemed to be hatching late morning. It was quite a site.

As for the termites, the apartment has a regular spraying company do the honors. Probably they come in every 2 to 4 weeks but do only about a quarter of the apartments at a time, so it would have been routine chemical. And it's never bothered my cat.

Most pesticides have a useful life value. They breakdown into safe components after a time due to certain exposures. Some breakers are: Sunlight (for photosensitive molecules; Moisture (from humidity in the environment); and, Mixing (with other chemicals they come in contact with). That last one is generally what gives the pesticide business the bad name it has. Some chemicals bond to others constructing a new complex compound lethal to mammals and of no simple breakdown method. Without being destructed by specific other chemicals, they then enter our water tables and food chains.
Since yours has to be re-applied at intervals, it probably breaks down after exposure to moisture. So, mopping near your floorboards would essentially deconstruct the barrier the technicians have established. I'm surprised you haven't been given a technical brochure about the chemical they used and it's life cycle and method of working. If you get in touch with the treaters, they'll probably give you a better story than mine (which, remember, is a shot in the dark from an unlicensed friend). The product used might also be of a persistent nature so workers have time to pick up some of the material and carry it back to the nest, contaminating it. Sixteen weeks between applications sounds possibly like they are on the outside of brood times and are just maintaining a continuous population to control rather than coming more often to destroy new hatchings and end the re-colonization cycle (management rather than extermination). Wikipedia notes that Neem Oil is used to some success. If that is what was used then it would be unaffected by moisture but susceptible to mixing with other organic compounds. In light of the difference between water soluble chemicals and oil based products, you really should find out what they used and learn how to live safely with that chemical type. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neem_oil

I am familiar with Volk Oil which is mixed with Malathion to control certain destructive pests from the Insect world. It may be the equivalent to Neem Oil if you are searching for it. I found the wiki entry for termites to be good for a brief discussion lacking only the value of time from egg laying to hatching.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Termite#Reproductives
If I find that value elsewhere, I will report back.