Indian meal moth (Plodia interpunctella) is considered to be the most troublesome pest infesting stored products. Most control methods are suitable for places like storehouse. My stored rice in kitchen is infected with it, I'm looking for a good and safe way to control this pest
If you have a freezer, you could freeze the rice.
There are pheromone traps for most stored product pests.
Keeping in an airtight container will help keep the pests out, but once in it doesn't do any good unless you first remove every pest.
You can used Phosphine tablets in the stored rice in kitchen to stop the growth and to kill the meal moth, because it produce toxic gas inside the container. Put the a single tablet in the a piece of cloth and fastened it and place at at different point in the rice for effective killing of lavrvae and eggs of the moth. You can use 2 or 3 tablets/50 kg of rice or wheat or maize . thank you
Best regards
Dr. Muhammad Ashraf Khan
You can try hermetic storage containers like mason jars, hermetic bags. The first step is to clean your commodity and then put in the airtight container. The airtight conditions result in a low oxygen atmosphere in the container which retards insect growth and also the container prevents any incoming infestation.
Hi,
You can try freezing, much effective in eliminating insects, it also kills all the eggs and larvae inside kernels as well.
Alternatively, use hermetic containers like glass jars, make sure they are properly sealed, they create modified atmospheres and insects die by suffocation or/desiccation
Muhammad Ashraf Khan suggested good and quick but take safety care to use it. Very easy too but not natural.
Hi
As mentioned by several others here, freezing is a good method of control. Be aware that the Indian meal moth has shown resistance to freezing when it is exposed to ambient temperatures of 18C (i.e. it produces a type of antifreeze that allows it to survive freezing for short periods).
As you probably know, much of the success of Indian meal moth is due to the high mobility of the larvae, which will travel some distance to pupate. This means that they can re-infest areas even after extensive treatments.
A good approach involves:
- freezing all susceptible foodstuffs (freeze-thaw-freeze if freeze resistance/tolerance is suspected)
- cleaning the affected areas thoroughly
- the application of a low-toxic residual insecticide if possible (e.g. to cracks and crevices; edges of cupboards - not to food)
- the use of moth pheromone traps to monitor treated areas.
Also, some highly susceptible food (e.g. muesli) can be kept in the refrigerator in containers or ziplock bags without damage.
Best wishes
Alex
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