As you’re getting ready to put on one of your favorite, long-sleeved sweaters and, as you’re putting an arm through one of the sleeves, you notice a spattering of small holes decorating your once fashionable sweater?
Unfortunately, this scenario is often a familiar one for homeowners dealing with fabric-eating pests such as the carpet beetle and clothes moth. All too often, people fail to realize they may have a pest problem, becoming confused as more and more clothing items come out of the closet riddled with holes.
How Fabric Pests Get In
Clothing moths and carpet beetles are both insects that cause damage to fabrics within your home. Carpet beetles are commonly brought into homes on potted plants and flowers by mistake, while clothes moths get inside through gaps around windows, doors, or cracks and crevices in your foundation. Additionally, new furniture or clothing items should be inspected for holes caused by fabric pests before you bring them inside.
What Attracts Fabric Pests
Stored fabric items are often targeted by carpet beetles and clothes moths because of the minimal amount of light and human activity. Fabric pests prefer to stay hidden, which means that it is usually stored fabrics—such as coats, sweaters, and other winter clothing that you pack away for several months at a time—that are targeted. Surprisingly, adult clothes moths and carpet beetles are not what cause the majority of the damage to your fabrics. Instead, it is their hatched larvae that do the most damage by eating holes through furs, silk, carpeting, wool, and several other types of fabric.
Ways to Keep Fabric Pests Away from Your Home
- Keeping fabric pests away from your home can be tricky, but some things that seem to deter clothes moths and carpet beetles from homes include:
- Keeping your home clean.
- Setting temperatures below 40 degrees in storage areas.
- Vacuuming, dusting, and general cleanliness, removing particles of hair, fur, and lint, all of which are attractive to fabric pests.
- Reducing humidity in storage areas.
How to Get Rid of Fabric Pests
The best solution to keeping your fabrics safe from these pests is to contact ChemTec Pest Control. Our highly trained pest professionals are experts in all aspects of pest removal. You can count on us to eliminate adult fabric pests, as well as their eggs and larvae. With our effective, year-round home pest protection plans, your home will be safe from all sorts of pests, including fabric pests.
Don’t wait for these fabric-eating pests to ruin your favorite coat or sweater, give ChemTec a call. We will ensure your home stays pest free for years to come.
