Woolly Bears (carpet beetles) and moths - help please!

[CarrieAnnRegardless]

We appear to have a mild infestation.
In my old house a pest man told me that the Vapona Fly Killer blocks, the ones in a plastic hang-up thing, placed in cupboards and drawers, would kill them. They don't seem to be sold anymore.
Is there some simple thing I can put in the wardrobe to kill them?
I don't want to start emptying everything out and spraying, if i can help it!

woolly bears usually originate if there is a birds nest or similar in loft. They eat kerotin based material (hairs, nails, feathers.... carpets). So they tend to start with something natural in the house like a birds nest. Apart from attacking the wolly bears themselves you also need to find the source or they will just come back.
The rest of your question I think would probably be easier to google. :)

hmm - I suspect that the source of woolly bears is my DP's habit of buying clothes in unsalubrious charity shops, to be honest!
There were certainly no bird's nests anywhere near my first flat where they occurred. But I did manage to get rid of them with Vapona.

ahhhh, glad you got rid - can you hot wash dubious purchases before they shed their travelers?

I do my best! Once he came home wearing a woolly hat that he had found on the bus.
yuk.
It's all very well, believing in re-cycling / up-cycling, but not if the resultant bugs eat your other clothes - a bit self defeating! His manky shopping is destroying my merino wool!!

hahahaha so true! Can you email him the link to this thread?

the old Vapona has been withdrawn long ago. You can get very effective vapour-release products for wardrobes, but they would not be big enough to do a whole room, where the vapour would not be confined in a small space.

Rentokil do a spray called Insectrol which is a mothproofer aerosol which I believe you can spray on carpets, but check the instructions. I think it lasts a while so clean the carpets thoroughly first.

IME carpet moths like to live round the edges, and climb down the gap by the skirting boards. Also in the gaps under and behind furniture. Frequent hoovering helps keep them down.

If you think you have moths, put a Transfluthrin product in each wardrobe or drawer, after you have vacuumed and cleaned it. All the mothproofing products that work have it in these days, they are usually one per half-metre of space and last a few months, but check the label. I get mine from Robert Dyas who have a few brands, usually one on special offer.

If you have an infestation, get some of those big transparent recycling bags and the plastic crates with lids. Put everything through the tumbler drier, the heat will kill larvae and eggs, then put each treated garment in a bag, or crate, and tape or tie it shut. Expensive things, or to be sure, put a Transfluthin product in the bag or box.

other shops sell them too

I love robert Dyas!

Why were the Vapona things withdrawn? Horribly dangerous and toxic? I should have stocked up!

The old Vaponas were quite big and would release enough vapour for an entire room, so I suppose quite a lot. I used to put one in the walk-in wardrobe. I remember when they were announced, one of the BP development team ate some to show it was non-hazardous. But I believe they were withdrawn due to health risks. Don't know if it was in the factory or in the home. I think it was Dichlorvos which was withdrawn in the UK in 2002 but I think is still used in the US and some other countries.

The new moth-proofing hang-up cartridges must release a lot less vapour, as they only serve half a cubic metre each, and take some time (days?) to build up a moth-killing dose in the wardrobe, with the doors mostly shut. They do seem to work though. The chemical is different (Transfluthrin) and I think I heard it is broken down by sunlight, so more use in a closed wardobe than in a room.

Would the moth killers kill woolly bears too, do you think?

I had a flick through the product description for Insectrol on the Dyas site, and I thought it said it did. Have a read of the link. It contains common insecticides and kills moths, flies and wasps so I wouldn't have thought it was species-specific. Is a woolly bear just considered to be a different variety of moth? I have only seen the case-bearing clothes moth.

The hanging moth-killers for wardrobes are supposed to kill adult moths, larvae and eggs, so must be pretty effective.

Ah - this one specifically says it kills carpet beetle Contains Cypermethrin which I think I have also seens in insect sprays for hard surfaces and cupboards.

Woolly bears are the grub of carpet beetles. like this

Oh, thank you, Piglet John!

I think not vacuuming enough is probably one of my problems

The good thing about the Vaponas was you could just bung one in the wardrobe and then get everything out, vacuum etc when you had time. I used to cut up the yellow plasticky, rubbery filling from inside the vapona case and put a bit in a little nest of tin foil in each of my drawers, and then leave half in the plastic case hanging in the wardrobe.