These caterpillars have been appearing for a month now, sometimes 2 or 3 per day, on my kitchen ceiling. I live around the emmental region.
What are they? A quick Google search said they might be moths, but I am not entirely sure.
Are they problematic?
yes moths! check your food storage. they feed in there and go out to become pupae. They like flour and pasta 😉 throw everything away!
Looks like a food moth larva to me. Check all of your pantry foods for infestation- rice, cereal, flour, nuts, seeds, etc. You will need to get rid of everything affected. We had this problem a few months ago and it was a nightmare.
This will become a food moth. You should get rid of them.
Throw out all the food in your cupboards and do a huge deep clean with bleach. Those things multiply like crazy and infest all of your food. They can even get into sealed packages like flour. We had them a couple of times in our old apartment and had to keep all of our food in plastic or glass Tupperware. They eventually turn into moths, but the biggest issue is that they lay eggs and nest in your stored food. They especially like pasta, grains, cereal, etc, but we also found them in the lids of jars and anything that they could get into. I’m sorry, they are a huge pain!
Lebensmittelmotten! Food moth larvae for sure!
Check all open nuts, pasta, grains, and flour in your kitchen cabinets for sticky web-like strands. You should have some moths flying around too. Get everything affected out of the house and dump it outside. Clean all cabinets and get some pheromone moth traps.
Get rid of them asap. I had them too one time and i thought they came from a plant. I opened a cupboard that i open rarely and like 6 moths flew out of it. Found the package with more of those bastards and got rid of them pretty quick. But i find some moths every second day in the kitchen though.
Moths!!!! I had this plague all over summer. You can throw away a lot of food. The larvae get through everything, except glass i guess. They were in lots of foods (rice, pasta, nuts). Also check where their „verpuppungen“ – idk how to call them – are. They were inside tupperware lids or plates/cups..
We dont have them anymore thanks to moth traps and „schlupfwespen“ we ordered.
This is why I keep my pasta in the fridge.
The moths will get into any but the tightest sealed containers. Once all your grain based food is in containers, also make sure to set up moth traps, and kill any moths you see flying around or hanging around chilling on your walls. Even a single moth laying eggs can start a whole new infestation a few weeks later.
Be sure to check all your food for crawling bits before biting into it. If you open a package and there’s a kind of almost invisible spider web, or food bits dangling in the air, like a grain of rice not wanting to come out of the package, or sticking to the opening, it has been infected. If you do decide to eat it… Maybe check thoroughly first.
Also, I would suggest cleaning your cupboards thoroughly. They can sometimes stay in small openings or corners and survive until later and come back.
My wife bought some flowers this summer and it was the source for these bastards.
Use glass jars for everything like flour, cereals, nuts, etc. Make sure they seal correctly.
Never had a problem with these fuckers since I switched to glass jars
Had them last year, it was horrible. I cleaned out the whole kitchen with vinegar cleanser and ordered predatory wasps. They lay their eggs in to the moth eggs and die wheb there are no moth eggs left. They are teeny tine and only recoginizable as black little dots.
Also get rid of everything contaminated. Bag it, freeze it and only throw it out, right before garbage day. Like that the larvae can’t contaminatw via your trash bin.
That’s a maggot, not a caterpillar
Fun fact:ALL flour contains **plenty** of flour worm eggs. The only reason they aren’t as big an issue anymore these days is that wheat processing plants implement machinery that crushes the eggs during the milling process.
At least that’s what I was told during an internship where I was tasked with counting flour worm larvae from samples processed with different variants of such machinery and then deliberately stored improperly (i.e. humid and warm). Even the best results still had like 10ish hatched larvae per 20kg bag of flour.
Extra protein.
Looks like a bad case of Lebensmittelmotten!
They’re trying to reach you about your car’s extended warranty.
Every food item I have is in a sealed container and yours should be too. So far I have never had this problem by sticking to this principle.
Olten Larva /s
Kill everything like this.
Search everywhere also in the plant
If you find one nest, no hesitation, trash
It’s practically impossible to treat for a non professional
Just free protein man eat this
We had them too a few weeks ago. Dozens of them , maybe a hundred, over the turn of a few weeks. Usually crawling up towards the ceiling. Whenever i saw one i crushed them with a piece of toilet paper and flushed them down. Havent seen any of the larva in a few weeks but we keep seeing the moths.
So we got some feromone traps. Found ar DM in germany (lebensmittelmottenfallen). I assume they also exist in CH but havent seen any. Its an A5 format sticker that goes on the wall and they attract all the males and they get stuck on the glue, so they can’t procreate. Seems to be working, as we are catching fewer and fewer of the moths over time.
Have not found the nest tho. Looked thru all the foods and couldnt find it. But i suspect they might have come from inside the cabinets (like inside the kitchen island, where we cant get to).
oh good lordy get ready for battle.
If they are pantry moths they are here for a fight but the good news is they are not bad for your health per se….just disgusting.
check all your food in your pantry. they particularly like tea, flour, rice. but I even found them on chocolate or just plastic cups…nothing is safe.
Be careful, they even go into stuff like dry dog and cat food! Almost nothing edible is safe from them unless you put it in good tupperware or glass jars.
Bleach cleaning is recommended but not needed when you tightly pack your food in containers. Once thats done they have no food sources left and leave/die.
Dont let any food laying around at all. No bred, no snacks, no cookies. You should also be careful about your compost!
25 comments
These caterpillars have been appearing for a month now, sometimes 2 or 3 per day, on my kitchen ceiling. I live around the emmental region.
What are they? A quick Google search said they might be moths, but I am not entirely sure.
Are they problematic?
yes moths! check your food storage. they feed in there and go out to become pupae. They like flour and pasta 😉 throw everything away!
Looks like a food moth larva to me. Check all of your pantry foods for infestation- rice, cereal, flour, nuts, seeds, etc. You will need to get rid of everything affected. We had this problem a few months ago and it was a nightmare.
This will become a food moth. You should get rid of them.
Throw out all the food in your cupboards and do a huge deep clean with bleach. Those things multiply like crazy and infest all of your food. They can even get into sealed packages like flour. We had them a couple of times in our old apartment and had to keep all of our food in plastic or glass Tupperware. They eventually turn into moths, but the biggest issue is that they lay eggs and nest in your stored food. They especially like pasta, grains, cereal, etc, but we also found them in the lids of jars and anything that they could get into. I’m sorry, they are a huge pain!
Lebensmittelmotten! Food moth larvae for sure!
Check all open nuts, pasta, grains, and flour in your kitchen cabinets for sticky web-like strands. You should have some moths flying around too. Get everything affected out of the house and dump it outside. Clean all cabinets and get some pheromone moth traps.
Get rid of them asap. I had them too one time and i thought they came from a plant. I opened a cupboard that i open rarely and like 6 moths flew out of it. Found the package with more of those bastards and got rid of them pretty quick. But i find some moths every second day in the kitchen though.
Moths!!!! I had this plague all over summer. You can throw away a lot of food. The larvae get through everything, except glass i guess. They were in lots of foods (rice, pasta, nuts). Also check where their „verpuppungen“ – idk how to call them – are. They were inside tupperware lids or plates/cups..
We dont have them anymore thanks to moth traps and „schlupfwespen“ we ordered.
This is why I keep my pasta in the fridge.
The moths will get into any but the tightest sealed containers. Once all your grain based food is in containers, also make sure to set up moth traps, and kill any moths you see flying around or hanging around chilling on your walls. Even a single moth laying eggs can start a whole new infestation a few weeks later.
Be sure to check all your food for crawling bits before biting into it. If you open a package and there’s a kind of almost invisible spider web, or food bits dangling in the air, like a grain of rice not wanting to come out of the package, or sticking to the opening, it has been infected. If you do decide to eat it… Maybe check thoroughly first.
Also, I would suggest cleaning your cupboards thoroughly. They can sometimes stay in small openings or corners and survive until later and come back.
My wife bought some flowers this summer and it was the source for these bastards.
[How to…](https://maggiesfarmproducts.com/blogs/bug-help/best-pantry-moth-traps)
Use glass jars for everything like flour, cereals, nuts, etc. Make sure they seal correctly.
Never had a problem with these fuckers since I switched to glass jars
Had them last year, it was horrible. I cleaned out the whole kitchen with vinegar cleanser and ordered predatory wasps. They lay their eggs in to the moth eggs and die wheb there are no moth eggs left. They are teeny tine and only recoginizable as black little dots.
Also get rid of everything contaminated. Bag it, freeze it and only throw it out, right before garbage day. Like that the larvae can’t contaminatw via your trash bin.
That’s a maggot, not a caterpillar
Fun fact:ALL flour contains **plenty** of flour worm eggs. The only reason they aren’t as big an issue anymore these days is that wheat processing plants implement machinery that crushes the eggs during the milling process.
At least that’s what I was told during an internship where I was tasked with counting flour worm larvae from samples processed with different variants of such machinery and then deliberately stored improperly (i.e. humid and warm). Even the best results still had like 10ish hatched larvae per 20kg bag of flour.
Extra protein.
Looks like a bad case of Lebensmittelmotten!
They’re trying to reach you about your car’s extended warranty.
Every food item I have is in a sealed container and yours should be too. So far I have never had this problem by sticking to this principle.
Olten Larva /s
Kill everything like this.
Search everywhere also in the plant
If you find one nest, no hesitation, trash
It’s practically impossible to treat for a non professional
Just free protein man eat this
We had them too a few weeks ago. Dozens of them , maybe a hundred, over the turn of a few weeks. Usually crawling up towards the ceiling. Whenever i saw one i crushed them with a piece of toilet paper and flushed them down. Havent seen any of the larva in a few weeks but we keep seeing the moths.
So we got some feromone traps. Found ar DM in germany (lebensmittelmottenfallen). I assume they also exist in CH but havent seen any. Its an A5 format sticker that goes on the wall and they attract all the males and they get stuck on the glue, so they can’t procreate. Seems to be working, as we are catching fewer and fewer of the moths over time.
Have not found the nest tho. Looked thru all the foods and couldnt find it. But i suspect they might have come from inside the cabinets (like inside the kitchen island, where we cant get to).
oh good lordy get ready for battle.
If they are pantry moths they are here for a fight but the good news is they are not bad for your health per se….just disgusting.
check all your food in your pantry. they particularly like tea, flour, rice. but I even found them on chocolate or just plastic cups…nothing is safe.
Be careful, they even go into stuff like dry dog and cat food! Almost nothing edible is safe from them unless you put it in good tupperware or glass jars.
Bleach cleaning is recommended but not needed when you tightly pack your food in containers. Once thats done they have no food sources left and leave/die.
Dont let any food laying around at all. No bred, no snacks, no cookies. You should also be careful about your compost!