Pantry moths: what food do I have to throw out?

Put the bin bag down for a minute. You rarely need to throw out everything. Pantry moth larvae eat dry foods, and they cannot get through glass or metal, so sealed bottles of oil and syrup, tins and unopened jars can stay. What you need to do is check each dry item properly, bin the ones that show signs, and give the moths nowhere left to breed.

And it is not a sign of a messy kitchen. Pantry moth eggs often arrive in food from the shop, in clean homes as much as anywhere.

The checklist

Take everything out of the cupboard and look at each item in good light. Open packets and look inside, not just at the outside.

• Bin it if you see silky webbing, food stuck together in clumps, small cream caterpillars with a darker head, cocoons, or moths flying out when you open it. Seal it in a bag and take it straight outside.
• Check carefully: flour, oats, rice, pasta, cereal, nuts, seeds, dried fruit, dried herbs and spices, cocoa, chocolate, crackers and biscuits. Opened packs first, then unopened ones in paper, card or thin plastic, which larvae can chew through.
• The easy ones to miss: pet food, bird seed, fish food, small animal food, dried flowers or potpourri, a forgotten bag at the back of a high shelf, a bag of snacks in another room.
• Usually fine to keep: tins, sealed bottles of oil, vinegar and syrup, and unopened glass jars, once you have wiped the outside and checked the lid rim.
• Not sure? If something looks clean but sat next to an infested pack, seal it in a bag and put it in the freezer for several days, then store it in a sealed container.

Found webbing inside a jar you thought was sealed? Either the eggs were in the food when you bought it, or the lid was not airtight. Bin the contents, wash the jar in hot soapy water, and check the seal before using it again.

Clean the shelves, properly

1. Vacuum everything. Shelf corners, the holes for shelf pegs, door hinges, the gap where the shelf meets the wall, under any shelf liner, the top of the cupboard. Use the crevice tool.
2. Look up. Larvae leave the food to spin cocoons, so they turn up on ceilings, in the corner where wall meets ceiling, and behind picture frames. That is why you can find a dozen moths on the ceiling of a cupboard you just emptied. Vacuum those too.
3. Empty the vacuum outside straight away.
4. Wipe with hot soapy water and let everything dry before you put food back.

Why bleaching every cupboard did not fix it

Bleach cleans a surface. It does not reach a cocoon tucked in a shelf-peg hole, and it does nothing about the one packet at the back with larvae in it. One missed source is enough to start the cycle again, which is why people who bleach, throw out half the kitchen and still see moths feel like nothing works. Lavender diffusers and foggers fall short for the same reason. You do not need bleach at all: a vacuum and soapy water do the job.

Food safety: do not spray insect killer on or near food or food shelves unless the product label says it is allowed there. Kids and pets: keep any traps and cleaning products out of their reach.

Store food so it cannot happen again

• Hard containers with a tight seal: glass jars with a rubber seal, or rigid plastic boxes with clip lids. Not bags, clips or folded-over packets.
• Decant new shopping the day it comes in, so any eggs that came from the shop stay sealed in one jar where you will spot them.
• Buy smaller amounts of things you use slowly, and use the oldest first.
• Store pet food and bird seed sealed too, ideally away from the kitchen cupboards.

Check that it worked

Put up a pheromone trap made for pantry moths in the kitchen and check it each week. It catches males only, so it is a gauge, not a cure: see what pheromone traps can and cannot do. A few moths in the first weeks can be adults that were already out. If you are still catching them after a month of sealed storage, there is a hidden source left, and our answer on pantry moths that keep coming back shows where to look.