What ate DD's paintbrushes? (lighthearted)

[wherearemypaintbrushes]

Hi all. Want advice as I think I am not being unusual but DD says I am. Just joined after a while of lurking I think the great detective skills of Mumsnet will be able to help me out!
I recently purchased a set of expensive paintbrushes for my DD's art GCSE. They work wonderfully and appeared to be very stable.
Yesterday, I asked my daughter about how her art is going, and if the brushes are any good. She seemed nervous of something and tried to avoid talking about it. So, I went to check her pencil case.
And, to my horror, I saw that the brushes were chewed down and covered in a substance that looked like saliva
I am very upset. We own a dog, who I at first thought was the culprit, but upon some quick thinking I realised that he would not be able to reach the pencil case. Asking my daughter, she denied it all and said they were like that before!!
Well, if they had came like that, I would not have given them to her!
Mumsnet, please help me to solve the mystery of...
Who ate my daughter's paintbrushes?

will have to throw because of splinters etc

It was probably the owner of the brushes..

Let the splinters be a lesson. She’s surely not that much of a beaver she’s whittled them into spikes.

Bloody chewers. My daughter still chews everything. When she was a toddler, I had to cover the ends of her cot as she gnawed it down a good centimetre or so. Kept finding her with a mouth full of soggy splinters. Her teacher told me that she once had to stop her from pulling her boots to her face and chewing her own shoelaces (this was in Yr 1).

Can't you just sand them smooth??

Kept finding her with a mouth full of soggy splinters. Her teacher told me that she once had to stop her from pulling her boots to her face and chewing her own shoelaces (this was in Yr 1).

. That made me lol on my own at home.
Kids are so weird!

Surely if it's just the handles they aren't ruint yes they will look like shit but that's her fault and she will have to use them like they are. By the time kids are doing gcses you don't need to be worring about splinters.

Moths can do this, not sure about carpet beetles but possibly.
I bought a fabric item with a zip, a smallish thing, a cover for a pet pad and when I put my hand inside to kind of open it up a bit I found a kind of white sticky stuff in it.

My paintbrushes which were kept in the garage , large brushes but made of real hair, had been eaten away in patches, so my money is on moths.

Just read the update, so not moths, but weird.

You can buy cheap brushes with plastic handles...not as nice as the good ones but they work.

Was it the John Lewis dragon? Has he been anywhere near? 🤔

Just saw the ends off.

BTW my Dad was an artist. He always had the bristle ends in his mouth - he reckoned it was the only way to get sharp point when doing fine work.....

If dc was innocent she’d have run to you all “mum, something’s eaten my brushes” sobbing.

She didn’t and tried to hide the problem so you wouldn’t know. She knows exactly what happened!

A trip to Aldi should solve this problem. With a “these brushes better not get eaten or you’re in big trouble” stern look.

Kids

I'm not sure that a chewed paintvrush would be dangerously splintery? I would just make her use them

Eh.. chop off the worst of the splintery bits and wrap the stump in sticky tape.

Sorted.

If I threw a brush away every time somedog chewed the handle I'd be broke!

Sandpaper. Varnish. That stuff that stops you chewing your nails.

thank you for your brilliant advice and funny stories
DD did confess to chewing in the end - have thrown them out and will purchase a new pack son. Thank you all!!

Wrap loads of electric tape around the handles, tbh cheap brushes are shite, I'd rather use good ones with shit handles! 😜

Why on earth have you binned brushes which are still perfectly capable of being used?

If you are that worried about splinters just varnish or cover the handles with tape. Although but GCSE age I would expect that your DD could manage to use them without injuring herself.

It's the brush head condition that matters.

Such a waste.

I also assumed it was the bristles. A pencil sharpener would have sorted the chewed ends, then a dip in Bitrex.

I don't think it's fair to make your daughter pay to replace something that you gifted her. You didn't lend them to her. You gave them to her essentially making the paint brushes hers.

If she was the one to have chewed them, it would only be fair for her to pay to replace them in the circumstances that she wanted a new set.

You dont know who chewed the brushes, it might not have even been her, maybe a friends done it and she doesnt want to snitch on them?

Probably your daughter