Hamster food and moths

[Pebbles82]

I just wanted to make this into a post on the subject to help people avoid an expensive and unpleasant time I had with moths!

Dried hamster food and treats can sometimes have moth eggs in them - which are teeny tiny like specks of dust. They can exist there without anyone knowing. Under certain conditions, they can hatch out. And that's what happened with me. I used to keep my bags of hamster food in a cupboard with pots and pans, with the bag cut open.

This issue can be avoided if you freeze the bags of hamster food (I leave them in the freezer for a week) and then store it in an airtight container like a lock and lock box. Since doing that I've had no problems at all.

It isn't the manufacturers of the food, it is probably from warehouse storing, and the moths can get into sealed bags of food (they chew through plastic bags) or lay eggs on the outside of the bags.

It's the kind of thing you don't know about unless they hatch out. Moth eggs can be in flour as well (hence Indian Meal Moth) and we don't know and it doesn't do any harm.

In my case though I saw a moth go in and out of Charlie's cage. And the substrate was swarming with them underneath - totally disgusting! Presumably hatched out from his food hoard. Did a full cage clean, disinfected the cage (had to throw away some toys) and a good hoover round and hoped that had sorted it. But bought some food moth pheromone traps as well - which didn't work and didn't catch any even when a few appeared in the room each evening.

Unfortunately once they are hatched they can go anywhere in the house and lay eggs - particularly food cupboards in the kitchen. And sure enough they were in there. Had to throw away all dried food in the kitchen cupboards and clean them out with vinegar. Then purchased lock and lock boxes and new food.

I thought I had cracked it until I found some crawling around inside my pots and pans in a different cupboard. It was the cupboard I had had the hamster food stored in and seemed to be the source of the outbreak. So another big cupboard clean and washing out everything in there.

The worst bit was underneath that cupboard was a storage area with all our board games in and there were moths crawling all over those too. I wiped down the outsides with disinfectant and bagged the board games up in black plastic bags for a few months, hoping they would survive. When I opened them recently there were no moths but chrysalis's were inside the boxes and had spoiled the contents - so I ended up binning the lot and have just replaced them.

So I would really recommend putting bags of hamster food and any pet food or hamster treats in the freezer - or any wood or hay toys that aren't sealed when they arrive (although it does seem to be from food items really). The only exception is anything that is not suitable for freezing. Some Rosewood treat sticks use raw egg to bind the ingredients - according to them - so read the ingredients before freezing some foods. It may be that some hamster mixes aren't suitable for freezing either. If something isn't suitable for freezing, store it in airtight containers like lock and lock boxes (according to my research those are the most airtight! More than tupperware). You'd then see in the box if anything hatched out!

The cost has been quite high. I spent a fortune on lock and lock boxes and vinegar. Replacing the board games was upsetting and costly. And I also had to re-buy some hamster toys. The wood and cork items were impossible to clean to make sure there were no eggs in little cracks. The time and hassle and feeling invaded drove me a bit crazy for a while and I really didn't have time to be dealing with it. And Charlie had a rather bare cage for a while and had to cope with a full cage clean all in one go and things being different for a while.

Don't get me wrong - they're just little moths - and I only ever saw four or five at a time, in the room, usually at night. But they can wreak a bit of havoc.

On a slightly interesting technical note I identified three varieties. Not all of them were pantry moths, some were general house moths (which will eat anything - food, clothes, carpets, the lot). And some white shouldered moths as well. I was like David Bellamy at midnight with my camera, photographing them and then squashing or hoovering them.

The only traps that worked for me a bit were the carpet moth pheromone traps - that caught about four, plus a spider.

Prevention is better than cure. I would recommend freezing pet food.

I had been buying Harry Hamster for 18 months with no issue whatsoever. I still think it wasn't from the Harry Hamster, but from either some treats or a bag of Oxbow Essentials that had been imported. But it could be from any pet food that has been stored in a warehouse that is mothy.

The amount of cleaning is enough to make you paranoid for a while! Hoovering really helps - not just carpets, but curtains as well, and inside hinges and crevices in food cupboards. The moths apparently are crafty at laying eggs where you can't wipe them out. Otherwise just wiping out cupboards with soapy water or white vinegar does the trick. After each hoovering session though, you need to empty the hoover bag or the moths just crawl out again and start all over again. So it also cost me a fortune in hoover bags.