How to get rid of weevils in an apartment in the kitchen: methods and methods of control, folk remedies

If small bugs appear in household cereal supplies, this is a signal to check the entire food pantry. There are quite a lot of ways and methods of fighting insects using store-bought or folk remedies. Getting rid of weevils in an apartment in the kitchen, with proper study of the information, will not be difficult. The main thing is not to stop at just checking one container of cereal or flour, but to inspect the entire stock for the presence of insects.

Who will you have to fight with: photos and descriptions of weevils

Weevils are dangerous pests of vegetables and grains. The ancient Egyptians fought with them several thousand years ago. These beetles of the order Coleoptera number about 50,000 species. Adult insects reach 2-4 mm, have a dark brown color and a characteristic elongated front part of the head. The bugs have poorly developed wings that they cannot use.

The lifespan of insects ranges from 7 months to 2 years. A female insect can lay 2-3 clutches per year, each time 200-300 eggs per grain. Weevils settle in the apartment, mainly of the following types:

barn - the most insatiable of its kind. Likes to settle in the kitchen and eat the cereal and flour supplies;
rice - can be found in buckwheat or rice cereals, does not disdain bakery products;
nut - chooses places to store nuts for his home;
oak tree - loves acorns, but if you settle in houses, it does not refuse the food supplies that are available;
beet - can live in gardens, vegetable gardens, using vegetables and fruits for food.

On a note!
The female weevil lays only one egg in each grain or grain. This provides the larva with sufficient food until adulthood.

Apple flower beetle

The most famous and dangerous pest in our gardens, it has chosen the apple tree for life, and less often settles on the pear tree. A brownish-gray beetle about 4 mm long with a thin, curved proboscis overwinters in cracks in the bark, under the leaves.

In early spring, at an average daily temperature of 6°C, it emerges from its shelter and moves into the trees. At first it feeds on the kidneys, making punctures; as a result, “crying kidneys” can be seen on them - droplets of clear liquid.

Then the time comes to lay eggs; for this, the females gnaw holes in the flower buds and lay one egg in each bud. The larvae, hatching from the eggs, gnaw out the contents of the buds and fill them with waste products.

Buds damaged by apple blossom beetle. Photo by the author

Unopened petals dry out, forming brown caps under which larvae or pupae hide. A new generation of beetles feeds on the leaves, gnawing small holes in them, and spreads throughout the garden.

Particularly great damage from the flower beetle is felt in years with weak flowering of the apple tree; in this case, the apple harvest may not be expected.

Where do weevils come from in apartments and why should they be removed?

The weevil gets into the home in cereals, which housewives bring from stores or market stalls. If no action is taken to eliminate insects in warehouses or barns, they will infest supplies. It is very difficult to notice a colony of bugs in packaged products. Since each grain in which an egg is laid is carefully sealed with specific mucus. Subsequently, it becomes hard, reliably covering the future bug. Thus, insects can be noticed much later than their appearance in purchased products.

It is worth getting rid of weevils in the kitchen not only because they transfer food, but because they are carriers of fungal infections and bacteria dangerous to people. Their secretions can cause various allergic reactions. Therefore, at the first signs of appearance, you need to fight them with all available means.

Important!
It is almost impossible to notice weevils. Their larvae resemble sticky grains of semolina. Therefore, they cannot be seen in flour, but they can be detected quite easily in buckwheat and nuts.

Danger to humans

A distinctive feature of the life activity of these pests is that they make unusable garbage from bulk food products.

In addition, the weevil beetle can cause allergic reactions in humans. The main problem is the appearance of allergic alveolitis. The fact is that the beetle leaves a chitinous shell in flour, which is a carcinogen. Baking from such flour can lead to gastrointestinal upset. And that's not all, beetles carry fungal pathogens and bacteria.

Peculiarities of weevil reproduction in an apartment

If weevils appear in a house or apartment, it means that they were brought in from outside, and in such a room there are ideal conditions for them to reproduce. When the female insect is about to lay an egg, she gnaws a hole in the grain, then seals it with secretions. On the 12th day, the egg hatches into a larva, which then turns into a pupa. A fully formed adult individual is already emerging from the pupa. The most suitable conditions for the appearance of new bugs are temperatures above 5° and humidity above 12 percent. The young individual makes its way to freedom by gnawing on grain.

The most dangerous species

Weevils can cause irreparable harm to absolutely any plant. Most often, a person encounters the following representatives of these pests:

Beet weevil. Damages sugar beet crops. In the spring, before the first shoots of this crop appear, the beetle feeds on weeds. After an attack by pests, the fields are thinned out, and root crops reduce their sugar content.

Barn weevil. It is considered the most common pest. Pests live inside the grains, first gnawing holes in them. Females lay eggs there - about 200 eggs each. into each notch.

Nut weevil. The female damages the green part of the nut, and the larva gnaws the nut from the inside. If the necessary measures to combat this pest are not taken in time, the tree may die.

The weevil is a stone fruit beetle. Adult insects feed on leaves and buds, and the larvae gnaw out the inside of the fruit of plum, cherry, sweet cherry, and bird cherry. When new fruits are formed, it is easy for the female to make a hole in the soft stone to lay eggs in it.

The cabbage secretive weevil causes damage to crops such as turnips, cabbage and radishes. Depending on what subspecies the insect belongs to, it can feed on roots, greens, or the fruit itself.

How to get rid of barn beetles in the kitchen

Small bugs can create big problems for housewives. It is impossible to get rid of them if only adult individuals are identified. There may be hundreds of larvae in cereals or flour. Therefore, if signs of their presence in the kitchen have been identified, then it is necessary to arrange an audit of all supplies without exception. There are several options for removing weevils:

It is better to throw away pantry supplies, since it is very difficult to detect the larvae with the naked eye.
Another option is to heat the cereal at a temperature of 50° for approximately 5-6 hours in the oven. Flour, on the contrary, should be left in the freezer for four days.
All shelves and walls of cabinets, and nooks and crannies, should be thoroughly wiped with a cloth with water and soap, then with a water-vinegar solution.
Ventilate the pantry or supply cabinets well after using the solution.
If there are too many bugs, you can get rid of them using a spray with pyrethrin. But first, remove all food from the cupboard. After processing, ventilate thoroughly, then put the supplies back.
Just in case, cereals that are not infected should be placed in the freezer for a couple of days.
Bulk grain and flour supplies are best stored in jars with lids that can be tightly closed.

For reference!
Weevils are quite unpretentious in food. They use rice, buckwheat, and wheat cereals for food. They also enjoy eating corn, barley, pasta and flour. They also do not disdain grains whose shelf life has come to an end.

General conditions for the prevention and control of grain pests

Any housewife wants to have a supply of food on hand. But you shouldn’t be too zealous, because no one is safe from the appearance of weevils. Therefore, you should not make unnecessarily large purchases that will be stored in a warm closet or pantry for a long time. The best option is to make purchases for a couple of months. The following precautions will eliminate the risk of weevils in the kitchen:

purchased cereals can be sealed in a pact and left in the freezer for several days. If the food was infested with bugs, then the cold will simply destroy them;
to prevent the appearance of weevils in the kitchen, you need to store grains in tightly closed containers;
Check the expiration date regularly;
Immediately clean up spilled liquids and spilled crumbs;
The interior of the pantry should be wiped with soapy water from time to time. You can add a few drops of clove or eucalyptus oil to the water;
you need to place bay leaves or garlic cloves in cabinets or pantries;
maintain correct storage conditions. This is a temperature of no more than 10o and a low level of humidity.

On a note!
The main thing is cleanliness. If you regularly clean your kitchen shelves and look through the products, you won’t be afraid of any insects.

Folk remedies: what are rice elephants afraid of?

If there are children or animals at home, then using strong chemicals to control insects is highly undesirable. What to do if there are weevils in your apartment and how to get rid of them using folk remedies? To remove bugs harmlessly but effectively, you can take the following several steps:

After purchasing products, they should be subjected to thermal procedures. The first option involves placing the cereal in the freezer for three hours. Second, heat in the oven on a baking sheet for 20 minutes at 50 degrees. To preserve the beneficial substances in products, you should not leave them for a longer time.
Microwaves will also serve well in the fight against rice elephants. To destroy the larvae, you should pour the cereal into a bowl of the required volume, put it in the oven and turn it on for 2-3 minutes. Then you need to wash and dry the grains.
Before putting supplies on the pantry shelves, you need to treat the surface and walls with a soapy solution, then with water and a small amount of vinegar. This precaution will drive the bugs away from the storage areas.
You can place peeled cloves of garlic, sprigs of lavender, orange peels, bay leaves, clove seeds, mint or mint chewing gum in the cupboard. To effectively combat weevils, such natural repellers should be placed literally near the products and changed at least once a month.
Garlic cloves and bay leaves placed in containers with supplies are excellent in the fight against weevils. There is no need to cut or prepare the garlic in any special way; you can simply remove the husks from it. Place red pepper in the peas, and a couple of pieces of nutmeg in the flour.

Other folk methods suggest using nails and salt to prevent weevils from entering the apartment. With the help of these means, containers with supplies become inaccessible, and the supplies themselves are not so appetizing. Here are the following two options on how to protect food from weevils:

You need to find steel nails, caps or wire. Wash the items, boil them, and let them dry. Place in containers with cereal.
Prepare a cloth bag and salt. Soak a flour bag in a very concentrated salt mixture. When the material is soaked, you need to pull it out and dry it.

To the owner's piggy bank!
To check the salt concentration in a solution, you need to take a raw egg and place it in it. If the egg does not sink, the solution is saturated.

Is chemical treatment acceptable in the kitchen?

One of the few chemical products that can be used at home consists of improvised means. These include: kerosene, turpentine, liquid soap and ammonia. The ingredients must be mixed in equal proportions, then the cracks and corners of the shelves should be treated with the solution. Before starting preventive measures, you should remove children and pets from the apartment for several hours, and then ventilate the room well. More serious chemical treatment of storerooms in an apartment is simply unacceptable. But, since rice elephants like to settle in food warehouses or barns, hydrogen phosphide is used in such storage places using the fumigation method.

general information

Weevils are often associated with garden pests. However, this is a fairly large species of bugs and includes many varieties, so these pests can also be found in a city apartment. Although most species of weevils prefer countries with a tropical climate, in total there are about 5 thousand species in Russia.

During the mating season, they look for places closer to food sources. And then they find themselves in a field with wheat or other grain crops. In apartments they can be found among indoor plants or in a warm and cozy kitchen. This is especially true for a species such as the granary weevil. Some studies show that the fight against weevil has been going on for many millennia; this problem was relevant even for Ancient Egypt. Of course, the vital activity of these bugs leads to a sharp decrease in yields and destruction of reserves.

Protecting indoor plants from weevils

Although rice elephants most often live in grain products, they also like to feast on house flowers. Their diet may include: hydrangea, rose, cyclamen. Insects will not only eat the flowers themselves, but also infect the root system. Because of this, the flower will not live long. There are several ways to get rid of bugs on balcony plants.

Folk method of fighting bugs:

The first option suggests preparing a solution from 100 g of mustard powder and three liters of water. Then add 40 g of laundry soap or ash. You need to treat your house plants with this mixture a couple of times.
Second, make a solution with pine needles, garlic or onions. Mix all ingredients and add water. Let it brew for two weeks. Then strain, dilute with water in a ratio of 1:10. Spray the plants with the resulting mixture once a week.

Store-bought drugs:

Aktara is a product that needs to be used to treat the soil 4 times a day for 10 days. Dangerous only for pests.
Nemabact is a drug that does not pose a threat to humans and domestic animals. It is enough to use once for effective pest control.
Antonem-F is a safe, environmentally friendly drug, its action is similar to nemabact.

Insecticides against weevils:

Fufanon is an oily emulsion that has a paralytic effect on insects with a fatal outcome. It may pose a health hazard, so it is worth working with it in a respirator. Very dangerous for water inhabitants.
Inta-Vir is an effective drug for removing home flower eaters. It contains cypermethrin. One eighth of the tablet can be diluted in a liter of water. The spray should not be used near aquariums.
Karbofos is based on a sulfur-phosphorus component. It penetrates along with food and thus destroys pests. Necessary precautions must be taken.

On a note!
Adult beetles can eat 100 times more food than their body weight. So, they can easily eat about 14 g of shoots or buds of domestic flowers.

Fighting with folk remedies

Since the use of chemicals can be harmful to human health, it is best to destroy the weevil using non-toxic folk remedies. For example, during the period of bud formation, you can treat plants with the following preparations:

dissolve 10-13 g of powdered mustard in 10 liters of water;
dissolve 40 g of grated laundry soap in a bucket of water;
dilute 2.5-3 kg of wood ash in 10 liters of water;
stir 5 g of potassium permanganate in a bucket of water;
grate 80-100 g of laundry soap, dissolve them in warm water, add 20 g of borax, 200 g of kerosene and stir the mixture intensively until an emulsion is formed, which must be immediately treated with the plants.

Professional pest control

If you can’t get rid of weevils on your own or they have infested your home too much, you should contact a special service. In this case, you can be sure that pests will be destroyed in all possible places of residence. The methods used by exterminators to combat insects are as follows:

The cold fog method works on the principle of mixing pesticide vapors, which are cooled in a generator and mixed with air. A kind of fog is formed, which settles on all objects that have been infected.
The hot steam method is most effective for large warehouses. Here they use hot steam, gasoline or gas.
Barrier protection is used to block all possible cracks through which weevils could enter the stock. Typically, this method is used as the primary one.

Important!
After using any methods to kill insects, be sure to wash the cabinet shelves and dry them. The kitchen, and best of all, the entire home should be well ventilated so that foreign odors do not cause illness to family members and animals.

Prevention: to prevent bugs from appearing in the house

The best method of pest control is prevention. Here, you don’t need any special expensive means, just a little time and patience. It’s easier to prevent the invasion of unwanted parasites than to then spend energy and budget on cleaning the house. Basic rules for maintaining unacceptable living conditions for weevils:

Storerooms and supply cabinets should always be clean.
It is important to carefully select containers for bulk supplies. These can be glass or metal jars with sealed lids. Special plastic containers also work well. It is better not to use bags made of paper and polyethylene; they will not hold out bugs and the food will be spoiled.
Before use, containers should be washed with water and detergent. Then leave until completely dry.
To avoid creating the ideal level of humidity for insects to breed, you can place a cloth bag with salt on the bottom of the container. This measure will help remove excess moisture from the products.
Supplies of cereals and flour need to be purchased for a maximum of 2-4 months. Thus, supplies will be constantly updated and will not lie stale.
It is worth carefully monitoring the expiration date. Insects often appear in edibles past their use-by date.
Adding garlic, bay leaves, and nutmeg to shelves or containers will prevent bugs from appearing.

Preventive methods

Preventive methods are necessary in order to eliminate the risk of re-appearance of “uninvited guests” in your home. So, the first thing to remember is not to make large stocks of cereals. You should keep no more than a month's supply. The longer the cereal sits in your house, the higher the likelihood of weevils appearing in food.

The second preventive method is to decompose all cereals into separate bags and store them in different places (for example, on different shelves). After purchasing cereals, you can place them in the freezer for a day as a preventive measure, and then put them on a shelf intended for storing food.

Use airtight containers to store cereals and be sure to monitor the expiration date of the product.

The kitchen should always be clean and tidy. If you spill something, immediately clean up after yourself. Once a week, wipe all shelves with soapy water or adding a drop of aromatic oil.

You can also place garlic cloves, cloves and other fragrant plants on the shelves.

Ventilate food - this is also an important rule of prevention. If you follow all these basic rules, then there will be nothing left for pests to leave your home, since you will deprive them of food and will also drive away pungent odors from your apartment

Tips and tricks for storing cereals

Capacity. Avoid disposable bags. They are easy to chew through. Try to use sealed containers or plastic. Before pouring the cereal into the container, be sure to rinse it. You can even use soap or dishwashing detergent. Wait for the cereal to dry completely and pour it into the prepared container.
Purity. Keep your kitchen shelves clean.