If you opened the door of the grocery cabinet and a small gray butterfly fluttered out towards you, you should know that you have a food moth. Food moths are not only an unpleasant presence in the form of ubiquitous moths and spoiled food, but also a real health hazard.
The moth lays eggs, from which larvae subsequently hatch. You can accidentally feed these larvae, along with the cereal, to your loved ones. Scary lines, but great motivation for not letting the problem go by itself. Armed with information about the enemy and methods of combating it, you can easily get rid of food moths and prevent their reappearance in the kitchen.
What does food moth look like and where does it come from?
An adult food moth resembles a clothing moth in appearance and can reach a length of 10 mm. The appearance of moths has nothing to do with the cleanliness of the kitchen or the neatness of the housewife. Most often we bring it from the store in bags of cereal, pasta, tea or cookies. There, in turn, moths appear due to the manufacturer’s failure to comply with the conditions for processing and storing products. Food moths can also enter an apartment through vents, open windows and doors. Most often, such migrations occur in the warm season.
Adult food moths could be considered almost harmless. Their lifespan is no more than one week, they themselves do not spoil food and do not eat at all, only drink water. If not for one “but”.During a week of its existence, one butterfly can lay up to 400 eggs, from which voracious larvae very soon hatch. Having appeared in a new place, the moth immediately looks for the most attractive products and lays eggs in them. Such products most often include various cereals, pasta, legumes, dried fruits, muesli, cookies, tea, cocoa, nuts, and animal feed. Moreover, moths can easily gnaw through cellophane, so whether the packaging is open or not is of no importance to it.
The first sign of food contamination is the appearance of cocoons and thin cobwebs in them, and then yellowish caterpillars that can crawl along the walls of kitchen cabinets. As soon as an adult food moth is spotted in the kitchen, or traces of its offspring are found in the cereal, it is necessary to urgently begin to get rid of the pest.
Getting rid of the pest
Revision.
The first step in getting rid of food moths is to conduct a thorough inspection of all bulk products stored in the house. Before refilling your closet with bags and jars, you must carefully examine the contents of each package. Sort through, pour undamaged items into tightly sealed containers and discard packages that show signs of contamination. Before reusing cereal storage containers in which insects have been found, they should be thoroughly washed with detergent.
Resuscitation of stocks.
If only a small part of the volume is damaged, you can try to save the cereal in one of the following ways:
- Fry in a frying pan or in the oven. At temperatures above 60 ̊ C, moth larvae die within 60-90 minutes.
- To freeze.The larvae die after 2-3 days at temperatures below 10 ̊ C.
But it’s better, of course, not to save money and immediately get rid of the contaminated product.
Cleaning.
The second thing is to carry out a general cleaning of the storage area for bulk products. To do this, wash the entire surface of the kitchen cabinets with soapy water. Especially carefully you need to wash all hard-to-reach places in the cabinet: far corners, various cracks, recesses, door hinges. This is where cocoons of food moths can hide and are easy to miss. After treating with a soap solution, you should thoroughly wipe the entire surface with a vinegar solution so that the moth does not want to re-settle in this place. After this procedure, you need to leave the cabinet doors open for ventilation.
Traps.
Everyone will agree that slippers are not the most effective means of getting rid of food moths. Especially for these purposes, there are adhesive tapes and special sticky traps, similar to similar products against flying insects. They are hung and posted inside cabinets and other places where pests spread.
There are so-called pheromone traps for moths. On the underside of the pyramid-shaped trap is a bait containing a pheromone that attracts male food moths. Through the holes on the sides of the trap, the moth flies onto the bait and firmly adheres to its surface. Individuals caught in this way cannot lay eggs, and the number of moths gradually decreases. The advantages of such traps over other means are their safety for people and pets, low price and ease of use.
Smell.
Sensitivity to odors is where food moths are vulnerable.To prevent a newly arrived individual from wanting to settle in your closet, you should equip it with one of the following scents:
- Garlic. To do this, you need to place a few cloves in the depths of the kitchen cabinet or directly into an open package or jar of cereal;
- Bay leaf;
- Soap. Fragrant toiletry or household;
- Tobacco leaves;
- Fresh citrus peels;
- Fragrant herbs. To do this, you can place fabric bags containing herbs such as mint, lavender, wormwood, rosemary, geranium on shelves;
- Strong smelling essential oils.
The chances that food moths will avoid your kitchen will increase if there is a pot of geraniums on the windowsill.
However, when fighting moths with the help of aromas, it should be borne in mind that odors are effective only against adult moths and do not cause any harm to the larvae.
Prevention
Food moths will no longer be a problem if you follow a few simple tips and tricks.
- Check cereals in the store before purchasing. Particular attention should be paid to packaging that is sold at a reduced price.
- Ventilate the kitchen regularly. Moths cannot tolerate fresh air.
- Cover the ventilation hole with a fine mesh. This measure blocks one of the ways moths can enter the apartment.
- Store all cereals and bulk products in jars with tightly closed lids. Glass grocery jars are best suited for these purposes.
- Keep fabric bags with fragrant herbs in your cabinets. This will not only not harm the household, but will also add some charm to the kitchen interior.
- Wipe the kitchen table and surface near the sink dry. This will make the moth less likely to find a source of water.
- Maintain cleanliness in cabinets and shelves where cereals are stored. Inspect such products as often as possible.
- Do not create large stocks of cereals and other foods favored by moths.
In getting rid of food moths, you should not spare effort and discarded food. If it so happens that a food pest has taken up residence in your kitchen, it is better to get rid of it once and for all than to tolerate its reappearance. Carefully following the recommendations for getting rid of the insect and following simple prevention tips will allow you to never again remember what food moths and spoiled foods are.
