oh hell.

[rmd]

so, i hadn't been doing a lot of baking recently, but i settled down to start a loaf of bread this morning for my guests this evening, only to discover grain moth carcasses in both my bread flour and semolina containers. the main all-purpose flour seemed to be uninfested, but i tossed it anyways.

sigh.

i haven't seen any live ones out and about, but for all i know the cats are feasting on them.

and now, the cleaning jihad.

Comments

[feste-sylvain.livejournal.com]

See, that's what happens when you buy organic. You don't have all those useful pesticides, and the grain hasn't been overprocessed to the point that moths don't consider it to be food.

(The main all-purpose flour was probably okay.)

The Real Useful Data: you need hermetically sealable flour and pasta containers. I think we got ours at Tags.

[chhotii.livejournal.com]

Argh, I hate when that happens!

[keren-s.livejournal.com]

We went through that and I agree on the hermetically sealed containers. But more than that, they may have spread anywhere by now. The first time we just tossed the stuff we knew was contaminated and put new stuff in sealed containers. The second time we cleared out ALL our stuff, washed our pantry shelves with a water/bleach solution (to kill any eggs), then put down bay leaves (allegedly they do not like the smell of them) and plastic sheeting over the shelves. We also put single serving things that are not in sealed containers (like a box of Annies' pasta & cheese) in plastic zip locked baggies with bay leaves inside (if we are not going to eat them right away) as we found those boxes infested too after the first time. Anyway, that all seems to work. And the cats seem to find plenty of other insect to feast on (spiders, flies, ants, etc.) so do not miss the moths.

[rmd.livejournal.com]

yeah, i'm planning on going straight to the massive "nuke the site from orbit" cleaning rather than a more restrained approach of "well, they were only in two containers."

[gayathri.livejournal.com]

I also found that at OSH, one can buy a phermone laced sticky tagged stuff specific fot these moths -- keep 'em around the kitchen, and the live moths are attracted. I kept all new stuff in the freezer, actually.

So Tupperware doesnt count as hermetically sealed? how can you tell?

[emmacrew.livejournal.com]

We have an ongoing grain moth war. I have lots of stuff in metal and glass now.

They also eat dried fruit and, sometimes, chocolate. And I second the usefulness of the sticky traps. If nothing else, they will let you know if there are any live ones out and about.

The larvae look like little half-inch long worms, yellowish or pinkish depending on what they've eaten. And they make little tiny webby cocoons in corners and crevices that can be fairly hard to spot.

[donnad.livejournal.com]

Stick a couple bay leaves in each of the flour tubs. It wont change the taste or smell of the flour but it keeps out the bugs. We have been using this trick on the carnival for years. A handfull of bay leaves in the flour bins. When your working with 200 to 300 pounds of flour in a bin at a time you don't want to have to throw it out if you find bugs.

Just make sure to either sift the flour or make sure you take them out of the flour before using it.

[liralen.livejournal.com]

Turns out, if you put stuff with moth eggs in the freezer for a week, it'll kill the eggs. So buying new, organic stuff, just throw it in the freeze for a while before sticking it in the pantry (after you've done your nuke from orbit work), and it'll keep new infestations from happening.

I now keep all my whole grain things in the freezer, just because of similar problems.

[emmacrew.livejournal.com]

Plus, it keeps the flour fresher longer.

It actually works best if you freeze for a few days, thaw for a couple, and freeze again. At least with wool moths. My understanding (which could well be wrong) is that freezing doesn't actually kill the eggs, it kills the hatchlings. So the first freeze and thaw makes the eggs think "it's spring, time to hatch!" and then the second freeze kills 'em dead.