The mason jars prevent moths from entering. The Mason jar is an airtight container that, when properly preserved, will keep moths from your food and keep it fresh.
Additionally, the materials used to make the Mason jar that will be opened for them to enter will not be consumed by the moths.
Question:
I have an infestation of pantry moths in dry storage. What attracted them? Everything is stored in [airtight containers]. What do I do?.
Answer:
As part of an integrated pest management program, we frequently concentrate on eliminating pests from restaurants by making structural changes like installing air curtains, screens, and caulking cracks and holes. Pantry moths are dangerous because they grow from tiny eggs and later larvae inside the food rather than entering from the outside to consume the food as a mouse would. They can be found in many products, but whole grains, flour, nuts, and other dry goods like powdered milk are particularly problematic because of their common name.
The good news is that properly storing dry goods in rodent-proof airtight containers can prevent pantry moths from escaping as well as keeping vermin out. If the infestation is contained, throw away the entire container and make sure to thoroughly inspect any similar products that might have come from the same lot in addition to your other products that are kept in dry storage.
If the moths spread throughout your dry storage area, contaminating other foods and laying eggs in them, the issue becomes more challenging. It is best to remove all potentially contaminated inventory from the area and conduct a thorough cleaning. Don’t spray anything in food storage areas—or anywhere! While it’s painful and expensive to throw away food that may be perfectly safe to eat, the negative PR costs of larvae moving around a guest’s dessert would be much greater. Your pest management specialist can use permitted traps to help.
As for prevention, maintaining a small inventory—frequently turned over—in dry storage; using FIFO (first-in-first-out) and storing food in airtight containers will help. More on pantry moths here.
Between, they are quietly resting in the same locations—in wall crevices, beneath refrigerators and sinks, at the backs of cabinets, and in drains.
Dr. Walker claims that you first see the larvae and then the adults, but by the time you see the adults, the damage has already been done. Advertisement.
Spraying inside where your food products are is the last thing you want to do, according to Dr. Walker
The four members of this gang will usually start out as eggs on food before finishing their life cycle in the pantry. Larvae can be eliminated by freezing nuts, dried fruit, and grains overnight before storing them in the pantry, but eggs may not always be destroyed.
According to Dr. Walker, there are about 20 cosmopolitan pests that have been spread by humans throughout the world. They can now be found in every continent, every capital city, and, most likely, in almost every pantry occasionally.