Moths

[oldrover]

I have a lot of wool in my wardrobe, and I have a moth infestation. Any advice as to how to kill the bastards. Seriously, they've done hundreds of pounds worth of damage and have the potential to do much, much more.

 

[rynner2]

Traditionally, mothballs were used. (But I suggest they'll be more effective if fired from a catapult! )

For more info on this chemical warfare, see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mothball

 

[ramonmercado]

I have a lot of wool in my wardrobe, and I have a moth infestation. Any advice as to how to kill the bastards. Seriously, they've done hundreds of pounds worth of damage and have the potential to do much, much more.

Bears, owls, lizards and spiders eat moths.

Wouldn't be practical to keep a bear or owl in a wardrobe so try a spider or small lizard.

 

[oldrover]

Thanks both. I'm tending more toward Rynner's nerve agent than Ramon's more 'organic' approach. But, moth balls won't kill the ones which are already there apparently.

 

[Mythopoeika]

Blocks of cedar wood in the wardrobe can (apparently) keep the moths at bay.
Won't kill them, though.

 

[Bigphoot2]

Blocks of cedar wood in the wardrobe can (apparently) keep the moths at bay.
Won't kill them, though.

They will if you hit the buggers hard enough

 

[hunck]

I have a lot of wool in my wardrobe, and I have a moth infestation. Any advice as to how to kill the bastards. Seriously, they've done hundreds of pounds worth of damage and have the potential to do much, much more.

I've had the same problem. The thing is, by the time you realise you've got a problem ie finding holes, they're already established. If it's localised you've got less area to deal with but they can spread rapidly & will find anything wool. Having eaten holes in pretty much all of my wool jumpers, they've started on my carpets.

The only thing to do to kill them is chemical but that could involve you vacating the premises for a short time as you don't want to breath the fumes. You can get moth spray which kills moths but it doesn't kill the larva which actually do the damage. Once they've hatched to moths they only live a short time & don't eat any wool as far as I know. Wool jumpers you can stick in your freezer which will kill any larva in them.

Moth balls & cedar wood will deter them but as has been said, not kill them. You need to go nuclear to do that. I wish I'd done that several years ago but then I didn't know I'd got a major problem until the damage was done.

If you do a search you can find 'bombs' you can let off yourself in a room. I think you have to stay well away from them for a while.

 

[Graylien]

You need to give the room a really good airing after one of those bombs have gone off and done their damage. I used one in my old place for cat fleas but I don't think I'd use one again as I suspect they left a chemical residue behind and I doubt it does you much good breathing it in.

 

[oldrover]

Thanks Hunck. By the way how are the overtones coming?

 

[hunck]

You need to give the room a really good airing after one of those bombs have gone off and done their damage. I used one in my old place for cat fleas but I don't think I'd use one again as I suspect they left a chemical residue behind and I doubt it does you much good bresthing it in.

Yeah that's the reason for my reluctance in going this route.

Thanks Hunck. By the way how are the overtones coming?

Definitely coming along! I can get 3rds, 5ths, & 7ths emerging by altering mouth & vowel shape. Easier at some frequencies rather than others. Nothing approaching the flute-like sounds the professionals get but..

Driving is the ideal place to do it but I don't do that much driving these days.

 

[hunck]

Driving is the ideal place to do it but I don't do that much driving these days.

It really steams your windscreen up in the cold weather though! A concentrated stream of warm air condenses on the glass. You have to keep your demister on.

 

[oldrover]

It really steams your windscreen up in the cold weather though! A concentrated stream of warm air condenses on the glass. You have to keep your demister on.

Yes, it does. I read somewhere that a lot of the Mongolian pros started off as truck drivers.

Mine are coming along too. I can get the sound, but have little, if any control over it. Still, on we go.

 

[JamesWhitehead]

My Great Aunties always smelled of mothballs. Maybe the things were more of a menace in those days.

Great Aunts, that is.

 

[Min Bannister]

I once killed off some fleas by burning cayenne pepper on a charcoal block. It could be worth a try? As with the chemical bombs, you need to vacate for a bit then take a deep breath, run in, open the windows and run out till it is safe to go in.

 

[Monstrosa]

You need to do a deep clean then spread diatomaceous earth in the area affected. Do you know that they're moths or could they be carpet beetles/dermestid beetles?

 

[Mythopoeika]

You need to give the room a really good airing after one of those bombs have gone off and done their damage. I used one in my old place for cat fleas but I don't think I'd use one again as I suspect they left a chemical residue behind and I doubt it does you much good breathing it in.

Yeah, good advice.
In my old place, I'd rented it out to a twit who'd got a cat without telling me, and then he let it get fleas.
After they'd moved out, I had to use flea powder everywhere.
I felt ill for a while afterwards.

 

[ramonmercado]

Yeah, good advice.
In my old place, I'd rented it out to a twit who'd got a cat without telling me, and then he let it get fleas.
After they'd moved out, I had to use flea powder everywhere.
I felt ill for a while afterwards.

I hope you didn't get catalepsy.

 

[oldrover]

You need to do a deep clean then spread diatomaceous earth in the area affected. Do you know that they're moths or could they be carpet beetles/dermestid beetles?

Oh, I don't know. Only that they seem to have only targeted wool, they've ignored all the cotton so far.

 

[Ermintruder]

My Great Aunties always smelled of mothballs

Were they from your moth-ers side? Or/and were they fat-hers?

The western post-war world smelt slightly of naptha up until the 1970s. Natural fibres presented a free lunch to nazi insects in our polar-maritime islands.

Nylon and Rayon spelt all-gone to the winged menaces, as did (presumably) centrally-heated homes and double glazing that sealed-out mother nature (perhaps engendering allergies in the process, but who can say for sure)

 

[Ermintruder]

Aha....this sounds evilly-effective!!
http://www.littlehouseliving.com/creating-a-moth-trap.html

"What you need to create it is dishsoap that will foam up, water, a bowl, and a light.

Place the water into the bowl and add in the dishsoap. It would help to add in the soap while you are filling with water so the soap foams up. You only need a few inches of water.

Place the bowl under a light. In the house we put the bowl on the stove and turned the stove light on above it. Turn off all other lights in the area.

Here’s our bowl the next morning. The suds are gone but the moths are there. No chemical sprays used and easy to set up but it works! And nothing extra to buy, you can easily set this up with what’s already in your house!"

Might I also suggest that a large glass bowl, with a light-source under it (eg a flat LED torch) will be irresistible to the moths. Put a few drops of sugar syrup (made from sugar in solution), and use slightly-warm water. Light attacts, the bubbles form an entrapment boundary, the main fluid dispatches them to Moth-halla

And it creates moth soup, automatically (Or is it a pudding? Wasn't his metacullinary conundrum stirred-up earlier?)

 

[JamesWhitehead]

Might I also suggest that a large glass bowl, with a light-source under it

This reminds me of those opalescent, art-deco bowls which were suspended below the central ceiling light in the thirties. Ours stayed up well into the seventies. Moths used them for dying in wholesale. Maybe that was their unstated, practical appeal.

Little moths don't bother me much and I cannot recall any serious moth-damage to our fabrics, though my parents never used mothballs. Large moths - by which I mean anything over a centimetre - give me the screaming habdabs!

 

[Ermintruder]

opalescent

This is the first 'opalescent' I've seen in 2016.

Thank you. I was starting to think it had faded out of use. That the Illuminatii perhaps viewed it in a dim light....

You know, I'm now uncertain that I've actually seen 'opalescent' used terminologically since way back in the early 1980s (which makes it 25% Wayne Sleep, 35% Galtieri, 15% Phil Collins and 25% Ronseal). All a bit Back to the Future...

But less of these flights of fantasy. Back to the battle on the home front...

You know, even just letting the blighters see all these mothicidal pictures might be a sufficent deterrent.

 

[David Plankton]

They sell quite a bit of moth-killing stuff in Lakeland.

 

[Ermintruder]

moth-killing stuff in Lakeland.

Land 'em in the lake, like. Smother the moths, stuff the mofos. But not with sage & onion, as that would be impractitactical.

 

[David Plankton]

This thread seems to be a whinge about clothes moths so far but I thought it would be nice to reflect on some of the common names given to British moths. Everyone knows Red Admiral and Cabbage White for butterflies, what about these for moths?
Alder Kitten
Argent & Sable
Beautiful Gothic
Bedrule Brocade
Blair's Wainscot
Chamomile Shark
Chimney Sweeper
Chinese Character
Conformist
Dark Dagger
Dingy Footman
Dusky-lemon Sallow
Exile
Feathered Ranunculus
Festoon
Flame Carpet
Flounced Rustic
Ghost Moth
Glaucous Shears
Grouville Dart
Heart and Dart
Herald
Iron Prominent
Jersey Mocha
Jubilee Fan-foot
Kentish Glory
Large Ear
Leopard Moth
Lettuce Shark
Maiden's Blush
Merveille du Jour
Mother Shipton
Neglected Rustic
Ni Moth
Nonconformist
Northern Spinach
Oak Lutestring
Obscure Wainscot
Ochraceous Wave
Old Lady
Pale Shining Brown
Pearly Underwing
Pebble Hook-tip
Poplar Kitten
Powdered Quaker
Red Sword-grass
Royal Mantle
Rustic Sphinx
Satyr Pug
Saxon
Setaceous Hebrew Character
Silvery Gem
Tamarisk Peacock
Tawny Wave
True Lover's Knot
Uncertain
Vapourer
Vestal
Wedgeling
Wild Cherry Sphinx

Some of them sound like racehorses don't they? From The Field Guide to Moths of Great Britain and Ireland, Paul Waring and Martin Townsend. 2003.

 

[Bigphoot2]

Dingy Footman - brilliant

 

[Min Bannister]

I think I like Lettuce Shark best.

 

[Bigphoot2]

Tamarisk Peacock sounds like a porn star

 

[David Plankton]

My favourite moth name of all time is Setaceous Hebrew Character. Here's one -



Setaceous meaning 'having a bristle or stiff hair-like structure'.

When we had bats in the roof, we also used to get a lot of these in the bathroom,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White-shouldered_house_moth

and when it says that the larvae feed on (amongst other things) animal debris, in our case it was bat shit that they were eating.

 

[Frideswide]

I'm supporting Northern Spinach FTW!!!!!!