My name is Jeff White and I'm the research
entomologist for bedbug central and the host
of bedbug TV bedbugcentral.com.
I have no idea how I got into bugs and bedbugs
and here I am 6 years later and having a lot
of fun working with bedbugs.
And I'll be talking to you about pest control.
You just opened up a package of rice in your
pantry and found all these disgusting bugs
inside of it.
What's going on and how do you stop this from
happening in the future?
What you've just encountered is a stored product
pest and what this is, is it's an insect that
typically infests the foods that we have in
our house in our pantry.
And there are a lot of different varieties
of these pests.
There are beetles, cigarette beetles, flower
bettles.
There are moths, such as the Indian meal moth
and then there's a bunch of other different
kinds of critters that can get inside our
food and eat our food, right under our noses.
And so how do you stop this from happening?
The one thing I can say for sure is that just
because you bought if from the store does
not mean that it doesn't have a problem.
I have bought things from stores in cardboard
boxes and plastic containers that I've opened
up when I got home and found bugs inside of
them.
And so if you ever open anything up and find
bugs in it, whether it's new or old, you immediately
want to dispose of that item.
The longer those infested items stay in the
house, the longer those bugs have to reproduce
and the more things that they can infest.
And so you want to seal that item in a plastic
bag and get rid of it in an outdoor trash
can.
Now, you've think you've gotten rid of that
problem, you want to go to all of your other
goods and you want to make sure that you store
them properly.
Just because something's in a cardboard box
and not opened, does not mean it's sealed.
Just because something's in a plastic bag,
does not mean that it's sealed.
I've seen bugs bore through cardboard, eat
their way right through plastic and the 2
best way to store different foods against
stored product pests is either by a sealed,
airtight plastic Tupperware type container
or potentially a glass container.
And those will properly protect different
items against stored product pests.
And once you do that you shouldn't have to
worry about opening a box of rice and finding
all these bugs crawling out of the top, as
disgusting as that is.
If you continue to see problems after you've
gone through all your goods and you're still
finding different stored products pests walking
around, you may want to call in an expert.
Because sometimes you will get weird things,
where bugs can get inside wall voids.
I've actually seen mice take dog food out
of dog bowls and then store them in wall voids.
And then the actual stored food in the wall
void, that the mice put there, get stored
product pests and then you find beetles walking
all over.
You might need a professional to help you
identify those things.
But you can do a quick inspection of your
goods, seal them properly and hopefully you
won't have the unfortunate situation where
you open up a bag of oatmeal and find bugs
crawling out of the top.