Question
I have been finding what looks like large grains of clear/white granular sugar on my wood desk for several months -- like the sort of sugar crystals you'd find on pastry.  At first I thought someone had eaten something sugary near the desk and the sugar crystals fell off, and just swept it up.  But when I cleaned it up, it came back, and does every time.  For a long time I was only finding it in the drawer of the desk that has paper & envelopes, but now I'm also finding it on top of the desk near piles of paper/envelopes.  I live in a NYC high rise apartment, so cockroaches were my first thought, but I've had roaches (years ago, never here) and this doesn't look at all like any roach droppings I've ever seen.  I put roach traps in the kitchen just in case and haven't trapped anything after months of use, and have never seen this in the kitchen, so it doesn't sound like roaches.  The constant reappearance near piles of paper sure sounds like I've got some insect that eats glue (the paper doesn't appear damaged), but I've never seen animal droppings that looked like this.  I've searched the internet everywhere and can't find anything that resembles this "pastry sugar."  Do I have bugs?  If so, what are they?  And how do I get rid of them?  It seems to be getting worse and I'd like to have a clean desk.  And if I don't have bugs, what on earth could this be?  I'm running out of ideas.  Thanks very much for your help.

Answer
Susan,

This does not sound like anything from an insect. Have you tried dropping some of this material into water? Does it dissolve, change the water's color? If it does not dissolve in water try alcohol. You might also collect some dry so they can be examined under magnification. Do you have plants that overhang this area? Some plants will exude salt, which will crystallise on the leaves. Instead of sugar this could be salt. The only other thing I can think of is that something is falling from the ceiling such as parts of a ceiling tile or decorative paint chips. Post a follow up and let me know if any of this makes sense.

Jack DeAngelis