Mole is not only a pest of clothing and carpets. In the family of these butterflies there are “gourmets” specializing in a wide variety of food products, and if you collect several copies of what eats moths in one place, the huge hangar is not enough.
The menu of different kinds of moths includes a wide variety of food products: cereals, flour, bread, fruits and vegetables, textiles, wool and feathers of almost any animal, and even wax and ant larvae.
If we talk about butterflies inhabiting home wardrobes, then we can say simply: the moth feeds on any tissue containing natural raw materials (wool, feathers, cotton, flax, etc.). This is her specialization, inherited from wild ancestors, and such uniqueness in food makes clothes moth very dangerous pest of our apartments.
Mole and its diet
Mole is not a product of civilization and light industry.All kinds of moths that harm clothes in closets, carpets on the wall and upholstery of furniture are not only not limited to the walls of human habitation, but also actively live and thrive in nature.
The clothes moth outside the apartments and houses lay eggs in the nests of birds and rodents. Here moth larvae feed on loose wool or feathers from nest owners. However, such a diet is very scarce, and the constant change in the temperature regime does not allow the butterflies to multiply at too high speed - they have to winter in the form of a pupa.
The other mole, harmful to humans, food, feeds on seeds and nuts in nature. She can eat stocks of rodents and ants. It is not surprising that in nature, these species of moles are tied precisely to the steppe and forest-steppe zone, where a large number of animals and insects are found that keep stocks for the winter.
It is interesting
A food moth does not eat clothes, and if butterflies flying out of cereals or flour appear in large quantities in the kitchen, you can not worry about the wardrobe. The food moth eats only cereals, dried fruits, nuts, flour, sugar, dry bread - the products that people eat.
Once in the dwelling of a man, the mole did not begin to change habits. Only here, instead of randomly crumbling hair and feathers in front of her, the "endless fields" of wool, fur and cotton fabrics, no less nutritious and tasty, spread.
Getting on the shelf with fur, the moth eats a fur coat, carefully cutting the hairs, chopping them and swallowing them. When she needs to move, but she is not hungry, the larva simply shears the hair on the fur coat, but does not eat it, leaving a neat path in its path. Once in the wardrobe with woolen things, the moth eats wool almost the same way as it nibbled in the steppes in the marmots' burrows.
In the photo below, the moth larva eats wool on a fur coat:
Other types of moths parasitize on textiles and furniture, the larvae of which are adapted to eat just such specific feeds. It is characteristic that all the larvae of moths are characterized by a tendency to weave silk sheaths. In some species these caps are simple and thin, in others they are made in detail and are very durable.
On a note
Clothes and food products are eaten only by moth larvae. Adult butterflies are not able to eat or gnaw anything - they have developed not only the oral apparatus, but also the digestive organs. The task of adult butterflies is to multiply.
Moth eats clothes randomly and does not have any particularly favorite sites and places. Holes on a sweater or tracks on a fur coat can appear in unexpected places and in quantities that depend only on the number of larvae in contaminated clothes.
But if the clothes moth harm the clothes rather slowly, then food moth reproduces indoors at an accelerated pace: its diet is more nutritious, and its larvae grow faster and pupate. Accordingly, the cycle from the butterfly to the butterfly, from the caterpillar to the caterpillar, can take place in the food moth in 3-4 months, while in the clothes moth this process takes at least six months.
Constant human companion
A person’s dwelling is much more attractive for moths than any natural biotope. There are three important reasons for this:
- there is always a lot of easily available food in a person’s housing
- in the house or apartment is constantly maintained constant and optimal for almost all types of moths microclimate
- in the dwelling of man there are practically no natural enemies of the moth.
Best of all, eggs, larvae and pupae of moths develop at a temperature in the range of 23-25 ° C.At the same temperatures, the person feels comfortable. It is not surprising that this butterfly always prefers to be a human cohabitant. Even insects do not need to fall into hibernation in the form of a pupa: they put on a cap, pupated, turned into a butterfly in a few days and proceeded to further reproduction.
In such comfortable conditions, a mole can even get away with less attractive and nutritious food than the one she used to consume in the wild.
How mole hurts clothes
The facts that the mole "beats" even synthetic clothing are known. Before considering this to be nonsense, one should first carefully study the composition of synthetics itself.
Even mol will not eat pure synthetics - the larva is not able to digest nylon or, for example, polypropylene fibers. However, if a thing is made from a mixture of synthetic and natural materials (which people still call “synthetics”), the larva will be completely content with nutrients from such a product.
It is interesting
Some synthetic materials in the stomach of the caterpillar are not digested, but safely pass through in transit through the digestive tract.The more synthetics in the caterpillar-eaten tissue, the less nutrients the larva itself receives, the slower it grows. Accordingly, on modern “bread” the development cycle of the moth can be stretched for almost half a year even under optimal temperature conditions.
Feedback
“What would such a thing do with this filth. A natural wool sweater hung on a trempele, knitted by hand - but no, the mole broke through the “Sport” rooster cap, completely synthetic. ”
Oleg, Kurgan
The larva of the moth that came out of the egg is not particularly keen to move away from the place of appearance. Usually, it eats away as much fabric or wool around it as possible, sheds it several times and pupates there. The little bag around her body, especially the dense one, is even more conducive to this way of life.
But sometimes the caterpillars, especially young ones, move within the closet for a distance that is sufficiently large for themselves, moving from newly acquired things to those already in time to hang. therefore destroy the mole need or on the approaches to the closet, or at the first signs of its appearance.
Pest control in cabinets
The main symptoms of a mole infection are the following:
- incomprehensible nature of damage to clothes
- small pieces of web on clothes and closet walls
- Butterfly moths, and not only in the closet, but also in the apartment in general.
Whatever the housewives who are familiar with entomology say, a mole must be destroyed in all its forms and stages. Even a butterfly flying around the room, although it does not eat clothes, but participates in reproduction. And consequently, it will give to the owner of the cabinet from several tens to several hundred larvae.
Butterflies are easiest to destroy manually - they are few. Larvae can be destroyed in several ways:
- diligently shaking out clothes
- roasting things in the sun
- washing clothes at a water temperature above 50 ° С
- processing and clothing, and wardrobe insecticidal aerosols.
It is important to understand that you can scare away moths with lavender, sections, orange peels or soap only after the larvae and butterflies that live in the closet have been destroyed. It is impossible to scare away the caterpillars with such means - they have nowhere to run - but they can leave their descendants resistant to such repellents.
Protecting clothes from moths
To protect things from moths, there is a large amount of funds:
- scare-repelling special sections
- essential oils
- crushed lavender flowers
- orange peels
- household or strawberry soap, pieces of which are displayed in the corners of the closet and clothing pockets
- tobacco
... and many other means.
It is important to understand that their effectiveness is not very high. If the mole was brought with clothes into a secure cabinet, she would have no choice but to endure the smell and continue to live and eat. Therefore, the best way to protect clothes from moths is to directly destroy insects and carefully check and process the items you buy.
Interesting video: comparison of the effectiveness of various moth products
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I have a question about the moth: how can you remove the mole in other ways?
Can be burned along with the cabinet. Radically, but simple. You can move and forget about it, until, because of the old bad habits, another mole, in a new place, will not find its way into your closet.
What nonsense about moth. It seems that the imago does not have a device for eating clothes. But the caterpillars eat, both indoor and domestic, they are fur coats. All bristles are trimmed, even if they do not eat))
Artificial and synthetic fibers are different things.
Can moths eat leather clothes?