My radio becomes a honeycomb - an insect I'd guess?

Factual Questions
1

I have a smallish portable clock radio that sometimes I carry from place to place. Apart from a good sound (It’s a Sony), like every other one it has a metal plate on the back with multiple perforations. Lots of small round holes.

So a little while back I have a look and notice ‘something’ has filled most of the holes. I imagine it is something like what wasps do building a nest, and the filler has that same sort of composition and colour. Brownish and crumbly. These are tiny little holes though. I never saw any sort of life around the radio though.

So any ideas or knowledge about what did this - and how - ?

2

Are you sure it isn’t just a buildup of dust?

Happens all the time with the ventilation holes on my computer.

3

I picture would help.

4

I’d guess it’s little brown ants, if an insect has started to live in it.

5

Sounds like makeup. Foundation maybe.

6

Thanks All,

sorry no photos - it was all solid and there’s no fan in the radio so definitely not dust, or foundation(!). I cleaned it out with a paperclip, kind of hoping to spot pupae. No luck.

A colleague I spoke to said brown ants do this and find useful nooks rather than burrow underground, but I still have never sighted the culprits. One of life’s little mysteries.

7

Mud dabbers made nests like this. Ants will too. Their eggs look like tiny itty bitty croussants.