Weevils!!

I can’t believe how much mess one mouse can make. It had been living in the larder. I’ll find out tonight if there’s more than one. I still don’t know how it had got in.

I use plastic containers with the kind of lids that have a vinyl seal inside and clasps on the outside for all dried goods, or if I don't have sufficient of them large glass jars with screw-top lids, or tins with tight-fitting lids.

That prevents weevils, food moth etc.

You asked what else you should do: make sure there are no crumbs, grains of rice etc stuck between the side of the shelves and the cupboard or the sides and bottoms of the drawers.

Mice are not a problem, as I am in the happy position of owning a queenie cat who devotes two mornings a week to keeping down the outdoor mouse population, and no mouse who tried to move in here would live long enough to eat anything.

Trubel does not, repeat NOT approve of mice, except as a freshly caught mid-morning snack.

I've had weevils in flour, tbh they didn't bother me and they just got cooked. I think the main problem is we keep our kitchens too warm so we hatch things that would stay dormant in a cooler temperature.

Having been away for a couple of weeks when I returned home they seem to have gone. I found a few in a plastic container that contained a box of Bonios but I think they were tying to get into the box: there were none inside. Everything is pretty much in airtight containers including my spices. However last night I went into the kitchen to make a cuppa and a mouse ran across the work surface. It seems to have been chewing some cling film that I’d wrapped round the top of a glass jar to stop the flour mites getting in. Wouldn’t surprise me to find it has been chewing the bay leaves I’d spread everywhere to repel the flour mites. I’ve ordered loads of traps in case they’re in the loft, too. I haven’t had mice for years and have no idea how it got in as all the doors are being kept shut. It’s chewed up a plastic bottle top so it’s probably made a nest behind the barge boards ( I’ve only just cleaned behind them as well). I despair! At least it didn’t seem to be here when I was away from home. I dread to think what I could have come home to if it had.

I can’t believe that they were in my salt, too! How can they survive in salt? They’re still crawling around on the shelf that is covered in diatomaceous earth although I haven’t seen one in the larder for a long time. I would have thought that would have been the most difficult place to eradicate them from as it’s all old wooden shelves. Just been speaking to someone that said Homepride flour is double sealed so even if you buy some that has weevils in it they won’t get out and infest anywhere else until you open the packet. I was so opposed to things being over packaged but now I realise why it’s necessary. I’ve bought loads of airtight spice jars and from now on all of my spices will go into them.

black specks in salt that hop about..............when an elderly neighbour told me this I didn't believe her till I went and looked.

We invariably had weevils in any bag of flour (not to mention other things inc. Weevilbrix) when we lived in the Middle East. I used to keep it in the freezer, to kill them, and then sieve the little corpses out.
They are not at all harmful, just decidedly off-putting!
I’m sure sieving would work equally well for the living little blighters.

I threw all my flour away after reading this thread ... it was passed sell by date BTW.
Have bought a small sr flour, put it in a plastic box and I am storing it in the fridge ... I hope this is enough to keep the little blighters from appearing!

I've thrown most of the contents of my kitchen out but the shelf where my spices were still have them even though I've, after a thorough cleaning, coated the whole shelf with diatomaceous earth! Everything remaining has been put into newly purchased airtight containers. I've bought airtight containers for my spices which will be replaced. I thought I'd got rid of them; can't believe they're still crawling around. I bought a new bag of flour yesterday which went straight into an airtight container and when I looked at it's best before date it was December 23!

They’re in the cardboard boxes in the cupboard. And also on paper that I’ve written recipes etc on. I’ve thrown the boxes out.

Yes, they look like fruit flies.

You mean fruit flies? Haven’t had those this year. I just have a jar with wine in covered with cling film with small holes if I get them.Haven’t had ants this year either. So it’s just weevil things and wasps in the wall. Thus far. Had a mozzie bite yesterday….

We've got little flies!

I've checked for any off fruit or veg, checked the pot plants but no, cannot find out why.
We're due a cold snap so I hope that will get rid of them.

I’ve also got wood lice everywhere. I’ve always had them in the house but not in the numbers I have now. I feel as though I’m under siege . Annoyingly I cleared out a few cellar spiders the other day and they’re my first line of defence.

MayBee70

They seem to be in the pepper as well. How can anything live in pepper? Good disguise, though!

Hmm - that's something I wouldn't even have thought to check! Don't think I'll bother, on the basis that ignorance is (sometimes) bliss 😁

They seem to be in the pepper as well. How can anything live in pepper? Good disguise, though!

I have found grain weevils in pasta products occasionally.
Usually pasta shapes I don't use a lot.
They are harmless - if unattractive!

I must check my flour shaker, the only flour not in lock n lock

We lived in the Seychelles for a couple of year. We always kept flour in the freezer together with breakfast cereal and biscuits. If a weevil got through I just sieved it out.

Bluecat - they would be pantry moths.

Lots of sorts I think - almond moths, Indian meal moths, Mediterranean pantry moth - probably others.

These things are absolutely tiny and look black. If I wasn't actually looking for them away from the flour, I probably wouldn't notice them.

Actually, I've just discovered that what I had thought were flour weevils were actually flour mites - smaller and lighter in colour.
You live and learn!

We purchased some Italian pizza flour in June from our usual online supermarket. I do have to say it made the best pizza ever. In September I ordered 2 more bags and gave one to my daughter. A couple of days later I was about to make more pizza dough and saw loads of quite large weevils in it. I then opened the new pack and saw much tinier weevils. I know for certain it was this flour as the new bag was put into a completely different room. I instructed daughter to throw her gifted flour out immediately. I then found that all the flour in my cupboard was infested. Makes me itch just typing this. I got my money back for all the flour spoilt from the online supermarket.

It isn't actually the contaminated food that's bothering me. It's the fact that, in the two places where the food was, the larder and one of the kitchen wall units, even though I've removed the food and cleaned the surfaces with a mixture of vinegar, water and peppermint oil when I looked in the cupboard today I could still see them crawling around. Given that I keep pepper in that cupboard and there are always little bits of pepper on the shelf maybe they've always been there, but it's freaking me out! The pantry is old wooden shelves with lots of places where the little blighters can hide. I 've put diatomous [sp]earth on one of the shelves. Ever since I found a larder beetle in the house I've always kept most things in containers.The strange thing is, one of the few things in the cupboard that wasn't in an airtight container is a box of cornflour and there are non in it. Even the contaminated flour was in plastic bags tied at the top and in a plastic container.

They’re harmless and you could consider them a little extra protein. They wouldn’t survive cooking, but you can just sieve them out.

If there’s room in the freezer you can pop your bags of flour in there as soon as you get them home, 48 hours will kill any weevils and eggs. You can use flour straight from the freezer. I keep the paper bags in the freezer, in a carrier bag.