Mystery moths- any ideas??

[0131trojan1]

We have small golden coloured moths, which disintegrate into powder if you catch them. Just odd ones, maybe see one or two each day at most.
No sign of them causing any damage ( no holey clothes, etc.), but don't know where they've come from, or whether I just haven't spotted the damage yet. Any ideas what they are?

I think of it more of a war of attrition...but it bugs me (no pun intended) too.
Maybe yours are carpet moths though, which might make it easier to keep under control.
I contacted the local council but they don't deal with this kind of problem, but it is possible to have your house treated to shift them but I've no idea how much it would cost.
A chum of mine who is a retired pest controller told me about the vacuum bag escaping, if I have a big clean and suck up any of the blighters I dump the bag now.

No idea what they are tbh. They seem to live both in the carpet and in amongst clothes, most of them seem to be under (in the carpet) or on the fireplace in the bedroom.
I thought about getting a pest company to come and check, they could at least tell me exactly what I'm dealing with and how best to deal with it, apparently they do a free consultation..

We have loads of the little buggers and I hate them. It's a constant battle to keep their numbers down.

I have bought several items from this site. The moth boxes are very effective at catching the males (actually it turns my stomach to see so many of them stuck on the sticky box).
We have wool carpets in our hall and they have chewed it to pieces. It's being removed shortly and we are replacing with synthetic carpet so I'm hoping that this will ease the problem.

They also love my merino jumpers (always the expensive ones, they never bother with Primark).
Good luck.

I Too worry about moth infestation as I sew and have a stash of material that contains silk and wool.

A friend told me that they steam their carpets on a regular basis and use lots of moth prevention in the cupboards I was also advised to take things out of cupboards and shake and refold at regular intervals.

beamur, your zippable moth proof bags sound good!

frequent hoovering (especially along skirting and under furniture) will keep the numbers down, as will a hot steam cleaner.

Washing and/or tumble drying will kill the eggs. I agree that AFTER doing that you should put clothes and blankets in plastic bags. If there are any live eggs still present they will be quite happy though inside the bag.

I reckon you need to use chemicals. Instead of the old mothballs there are impregnated carboard and plastic hangers you can use. You need one to every half-cubic-metre of wardrobe space, or one per drawer. You have got to hoover out and wipe clean all your wardrobes first, and underneath/behind them. You can get a persistent insecticide spray that leaves a coating on hard surfaces (they like to lay eggs in cracks)

Once you have got an infestation you have to take great pains to clear it, for a year or so.

We had an infestation a couple of years ago and I got a lot of those clear plastic crates and put stuff in them after tumbling, with a moth killer in each (even clean clothes might get a moth laying eggs on them) as they do their worst damage on clothes that you do not wear and launder frequently.

The modern moth killer smells of lavender, not mothballs, and kills eggs as well as larvae. The stuff I use used to be branded Bouchard but I think they changed the name. You can get it at places like Robert Dyas. I don't think "moth repellents" like cedar balls will have much effect if you already have eggs and larvae in the house.

Old thread but we have had an infestation of the gold moths. Never had a problem before and lived here for 25 years. I'Ve always been very careful re:storing knitting wool and natural fibre clothes. I'm on the case every day swatting the critters and sticky fly strips work too. Has made a lot of work!

PigletJohn's advice is good.

I had a serious infestation caused, almost certainly, by someone bringing in a weekend bag with infested clothes. It took me two years to rid the house of nearly all of them and I'll still see the odd straggler at particular times of year.

For me, judicious use of chemicals if you can, moth traps and hoovering like a mad thing should do it. Eternal vigilance is required, though, if you have anything non-synthetic around - they can come from anywhere and you can't allow them to gain a foothold.

We got rid.

Wash EVERYTHING and then store in sealed bags till the problem is dealt with.

Wet Vac the carpets.

Move furniture - you can get spray on bug killer that will kill the larvae.

Buy the lavender moth balls from Lakeland and have them everywhere there are clothes and a few around the edges of the carpet if you don't have kids/pets.

Look for little thread like cases - these are the larvae.

Regularly vacuum the wardrobe and take everything out (and out of drawers). Shake and put back. Do this once it is under control.

My parents had a bad infestation which I dealt with. Even now sometimes when I visit I find them and once I opened my case coming back home and there was one! They are a pain to get rid of.

I had these for weeks/months. Was seeing a couple a day all over the house. No damage yo clothes, etc.

Couldn't work out where they were coming from.

One day I noticed one crawling between the wooden planks on the under stairs cupboard door. I opened the cupboard, shifted the Hoover, shifted a box and omfg it was like a scene from im a celebrity. Hundreds/thousands of pupae and crawling moths. There was a box with shoes in a big canvas type bag and they were eating that, and eating the carpet in there.

I totally emptied the cupboard, binned the carpet, had to bin some shoes and handbags as they were wrecked. Put moth traps down in there. Hoovered it all out loads.

We've had/got case bearing clothes moths eating the woollen carpets. We had tiny white cylinder things hanging off the ceiling, if you fiddle with them the caterpillary thing pops out. Move your furniture in rooms with woollen carpets, they get everywhere, even under the feet, all through chests of drawers etc. Utter nightmare. Lots of hoovering and diatomaceous earth and we're getting there...

As back to dealing with the critters (endless vacuuming, washing & freezing stuff) I notice they prefer this variety of sticky fly paper to another one.

Above should say "As back up...."

One night i found 2 of the critters in a glass, i covered it to see how long they live with no food or water. one lasted 6.5 days the other 7.5 days. Was abit gobsmacked how resilient they are :(