Moth Control and About Pantry Moths
Having pests creeping and crawling around your home is most certainly a disturbing feeling for most people. Constantly feeling like you cannot get comfortable because you do not know what is lurking around you can make you uncomfortable. An even worse feeling is opening up your pantry only to find more bugs crawling all over your food! Finding pantry moth control immediately when signs start to appear is necessary to mitigate a full spread infestation.
Pantry moth activity is not obvious at first, but it is challenging to manage alone once it spreads. Just a few adult pantry moths are all it takes for a complete infestation to take over your food storage.
Pantry Moths Habits
More often than not, the single most frequent type of pantry moth one will find in their pantry is the Indianmeal moth. These moths are detrimental to the food storage in your home because of their larvae. They will lay their eggs in areas that will provide the larvae with a plentiful amount of available resources. Pantry Moths tend to infest mostly grains but hold no biases towards other types of foods like rice and nuts.
The larvae of a pantry moth are the most concerning because of their size and destructiveness. They are what causes the real damage to your food storage, unlike pupae or adults. The key to successful moth control is early detection of their habits and stopping the growth process before they spread.
Life Cycles
A pantry moth goes through four distinct stages in life including an egg, larvae, pupa, and adult phases. The average lifespan of a single pantry moth does not exceed any longer than a year. The life cycle of a pantry moth is quick, resulting in severe issues for homeowners. Pantry moth rapid life cycles means they can lay several generations in one pantry in less than a year.
Egg Phase
The female can lay up to four hundred eggs either in one location or scattered in different areas. She will choose where to lay eggs depending on the number of available resources for the larvae. Depending on conditions, the eggs will take about seven to eight days to hatch.
Larval Phase
The pantry moth larvae phase is the most concerning because they will eat seemingly everything. The larvae of a pantry moth are not typically any larger than half-inch and are an off-white coloration. They will chew through cardboard and thin plastic, making even sealed food open for infestation. Larvae will cast silk webs onto food products to catch other contaminants like fecal pellets and cast skins.
They will go through five to seven instars, or growths, during the larval phase before they begin to pupate. They will travel a considerable distance from food storage to pupate, which leads people to think they have clothing pests. The unfortunate truth of the larvae phase is that it may last from six to eight weeks, assuming good conditions. When trying to identify pantry moth larvae, look for whitish-looking tiny caterpillars.
Pupae and Adult Phases
The pupae phase typically requires that the larvae cast a silk cocoon and continue physical development. Pupal stages last for roughly less than a month before emerging as adults. If they are larvae in the pantry, they may crawl to other areas inside the pantry before pupating. This re-location may take away from finding the source of the infestation since they do not pupate in the same spot.
Once pantry moths reach adulthood, they cease eating as viciously as larvae do and instead focus on mating. Finding adults will be typically the first and most common indicator of pantry moth infestations. They will only live for less than a month, but that is all they need to lay hundreds of eggs. Adult pantry moths are attracted to light and never fly directly, but more so scattered with their orientational flying.
Signs of Pantry Pest Activity
Pantry moth control starts early, and early detection begins with looking for the signs of their activity. The signs and symptoms may be subtle until eggs hatch and larvae take over the pantry. Once larvae are active, the signs and symptoms of pantry moths become more evident until they move into pupation.
- Unusual smells coming from the pantry (check for mold food, before assuming pantry moth)
- Silk webbing in corners of the pantry or boxes of food.
- Food boxes or containers made of cardboard or thinly-layered plastic have peculiar holes.
- Random flying moths- these are the adults.
- Sightings of active larvae crawling around the pantry
- Seeing pantry moth pupae cocooned through the pantry
Pest Threat Level 3/10
Get Your Pantry Moth Control Today!
If you find signs of pantry moths taking over your home, it may be time to call in the professionals. Handling a pantry pest infestation on your own is difficult and often requires a level of expertise to control. Call Prime Pest Solutions for the best pantry moth control program in our community. The team at Prime Pest Solutions is ready to walk you through the control steps and rid pantry moths from your home.
Contact Prime Pest Solutions today for a free estimate for service and to get more details on our pantry pest control process. We will ensure the control process is as painless as possible as we attack the pests with a highly detail-oriented approach. The best method to handling pantry moths is with the use of strategically placed mechanical pest control techniques.
