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Welcome again to the Faith Pest Control podcast. Hi, I’m Mike Stewart, your host and we’re here today with pest expert Fred Talley of Faith Pest Control, Faith Pest Control services all the fine folks in Jasper, Georgia, Blue Ridge, Georgia Ellijay, Georgia and pretty much anywhere in the North Georgia mountains. If you have a pest problem, Fred Talley is the man to take care of those problems. And now here’s Fred Talley.
So today we’re going to talk about Indian meal moths. Any male moths are actually very common household pests and they feed mainly on stored food products. There is a school of thought that the Indian meal moth is one of if not the most important pest of stored food products. In the United States. The larvae are general feeders are referred to as general feeders and they feed on grains, grain products, seeds, dried fruits, nuts, cereals, dog food and spices. The Indian meal moth has actually saved its common name from the United States where it was found to be a pest of meal made from Indian corn. The Indian meal moth is found and stored products and food stores facilities around the world and in a wide range of climates. And again, it’s a very common pest here in North Georgia. Then you mail moth with its wings expanded can be as much as about three quarters of an inch wide. It’s actually pretty easy to tell it apart from other grain pest. primarily due to the markings on it’s four wings there are reddish brown on the rear two thirds of the wings but a whitish gray on the front 34 They connect to the body. The hind wings do have distinctive marten markings. The hand wings do not have distinctive markings, or pretty much just the uniform gray. Adults can be seen, you know resting on the surface of the grain. But generally you’re going to see them on the walls of your pantry, up around the ceiling in your kitchen around the light fixtures in your kitchen because the adults fly mainly at night and with as a lot of other insects that are attracted to the light. The eggs of the Indian meal moth or a whitish color but they’re very small and oval in shape. Because of their small size they’re very difficult to see without using a microscope. The eggs can be deposited on the surface of the grain as a single egg or in groups of eggs. Newly hatched larva very small can be very difficult to see. The larger larvae our use are usually either a yellowish greenish or sometimes a pinkish color. The fully grown larvae are normally about a half to five eighths of an inch long and have a brownish kind of head capsule the the larvae will have three pair legs near their head and five pear towards their abdomen. As they become fully grown the larva they will spin away in like a cocoon and leave behind silken threads actually where they crawl. Most times there are enough of these thread pieces. For you know for somebody to notice that there’s a problem with they open up a bag of spaghetti or some type of pasta or rice, loosely clinging webbing on the grain is very characteristic of Indian meal moth. As long as the temperature stays above 50 degrees Fahrenheit inside a home, the Indian meal moth can survive and reproduce. The typical lifecycle from egg to adult is completed in 40 to 55 days depending on environmental conditions. Therefore the potential for up to nine generations per year exists and can be very common in a home with with conditioned air. Under ideal conditions, the entire lifecycle from egg to adult can be completed in as little as just 28 days. After a mature female lays her eggs, the larvae will begin to hatch in a couple of days two to a couple of weeks depending on again the environmental conditions. The newly hatched larva feed on the fine materials from the grain. The they can be very small, they are very small can be hard to see, because they they they’re so small they actually pass through a screen mesh that measures point 001 inches that’s one one thousandths of an inch. Because of this microscopic size, it’s difficult at best to keep the larva out of the package foods and grains. The larva however, cannot chew through the packaging so they will either enter through a hole in the packaging or through the scene. This larval stage can last from two weeks up to a year. The larval stage is also the stage is responsible for the loss of food products. Actually, that’s probably they’re responsible for the consumption of the food products. Just the presence sometimes of these insects is responsible for the loss of that food product. When they mature, the larva spends a silken cocoon and transforms into a pupae. The cocoons and pupate can be seen on the ground surface, the dirt adults emerge. Depending on environmental conditions in a week to four weeks, typically, they will mate and then the females lay the next generation of eggs. The adults live from about five days to up to about 25 days. It would be a very wise idea to examine any and all store food stored food products brought into the home from the grocery store for the tail tail white worms and webbing evident in the infested product. Otherwise, the infestation can most likely will spread to the other stored products in your pantry. in warmer climates, since we have here in North Georgia, it’s probably not a terrible idea to store all your meals and flowers inside the refrigerator. Typically, insecticides or pesticides are not a big benefit. If Indian meal moths are already infesting your stored grains or food products, elimination and exclusion are the keys to controlling Indian meal moth infestations if you discover an infestation of Indian male moths at home, the simplest and probably realistically the least costly solution is to either discard the infested food products or put those products in the freezer and freeze them at zero degrees Fahrenheit for four days. Any uninfested foods that are susceptible to infestation should be placed in saleable airtight containers. Oftentimes, pet food and bird seed are overlooked as a possible infestation side. These two should be kept in sealed airtight containers. Typically, the solution to getting rid of an Indian meal moth infestation is to go through your pantry and examine every item one at a time and determine if that particular product is or is not infested, and either discarding or freezing it for four days to get rid of the infestation. I am very well aware that the process of going through all of your stored grains and grain products is a pain. But in reality that is the cheapest and best solution to you’re most likely going to miss and infested products in your pantry the first and sometimes even your second time through. But if you continue to have an Indian meal moth infestation, go through your pantry or cupboard again 100% of the time that I’ve ever had a customer tell me they have thoroughly gone through their pantry and totally gotten rid of all their infested food products. I will go through their pantry and find something that is still infested that you have to be extremely thorough during this process. At fates pest control, we offer a free consultation and a 100% money back make you happy guarantee. If you hire faith pest control to get rid of your bug problem. And at the end of 30 days, you’re not 100% Happy, we’ll come back and retreat your home for free. And we’ll keep on trading it for free until you tell us that you are happy. If that still doesn’t make you happy. We’ll give you back every penny you spent on the original treatment. Plus we’ll pay you an additional $25 for your time in trouble just for fooling with us. Bottom line is I want you to be happy with the service we provide. Are you owe us a penny? If you feel like what I’ve said makes sense, please call fetes pest control today is 770-823-9202 and asked to speak to me Fred Talley. I’ll be more than happy to speak with you and answer any questions that you may have.
