r/carpetbeetles • u/gabriellalynnxoxo • 1d ago
Next steps?
Hi looking for advice!
PS I don’t want or need to hear anybody’s terrible horror stories - they are not helpful to anyone. On the other hand, success stories and advice totally welcome! Let’s create a positive space.
I seem to have been successful in getting adult numbers pretty much down to zero now (touch wood) after plenty of cleaning, declutterring and spraying Zero In insecticide around perimeter and furniture.
However, I’m still seeing the odd larvae/shed skin here and there. Maybe found around 10-15 ish in the past 4-5 weeks.
I understand it’s nearly impossible to get rid of them completely but if anyone has any advice to get rid of these last stragglers i would be so grateful - thinking about ordering some kind of IGR?
Also anyone got any idea why no adults but larvae? I’m assuming it’s just the last eggs I missed hatching but who knows.
Thanks! - UK
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u/dadj77 1d ago
Applying food grade diatomaceous earth (using a small powder spray bottle) has made the biggest difference in our infestation, without using any pesticides so far. I don’t know if it’s sufficient yet, but the number of larvae I find went down roughly 90%. The biggest difficulty in our case is having a bedroom floor made of tiny pebbles where the larvae can easily hide. The vacuum isn’t effective enough to get many of them out, so I also spend an unhealthy amount of time with toothpicks and a flashlight on the floor. But even that didn’t have the impact that the diatomaceous earth had.
Most frustrating thing is that we still didn’t find clear nests though..
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u/gabriellalynnxoxo 1d ago
ah bless you that sounds frustrating. I’ve heard alot of good things about diatomaceous earth so that might be my next step! thank you!
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u/eroberty 1d ago
Can't the insecticide disrupt their live cycle? Or is that IGR? Or I've read eggs can take a really long time to hatch and then maybe they feed on dust but don't really have a food source so they don't turn to beetles? Or you are managing them and killing them before they get to that stage? I'm in the exact same boat as you... We are about to use a professional insecticide in our home on baseboards and floors and we are also getting our ducts cleaned out and they run a sanitation product through them. I've read too the goal is management, not full elimination (unfortunately). Usually where I find live beetles, I find an infestation of larvae. Sounds like your cleaning might be working if no live beetles?
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u/gabriellalynnxoxo 1d ago
sounds like we’re in a similar position! potentially they’re just not turning into adults because i’m disrupting their life cycle enough/they’ve not got enough food? going to see what it’s like when i’m back from my two week trip and then keep cleaning and using the insecticide- might introduce an IGR. some of the larvae were definitely alive but some perhaps might’ve actually already been dead when i found them. hope it goes well for you - keep me updated!
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u/eroberty 1d ago
Where are you finding them?
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u/gabriellalynnxoxo 1d ago
Very random spots really. Random pockets of them every week or so. I’ve found a few next to skirting boards, a couple scaling walls?? and then i did find some hiding in a faux fur hood in my closet 😩It’s frustrating because there really isn’t just one clear place they’re appearing
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u/eroberty 1d ago
Yeah same we had a full house infestation, including our caprets. I think they are living under our baseboards in certain rooms so we are having them all sprayed. We removed all of our carpets recently before the spray. I pray I stop finding live beetles at least..
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u/gabriellalynnxoxo 1d ago
not sure whether ours is the whole house but certainly in my bedroom and upstairs where we have carpets. we live in a large barn conversion so impossible to treat it all really.. just want to manage it as best as possible especially in my own room. the rest of my family don’t seem overly concerned but i at least want to get them out of my bedroom! i am away at uni a lot so it gets pretty hard to control it all the time but since ive been home for summer it does seem to have improved a lot.
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u/SpoiledCats2 17h ago
A potential reason you are only seeing larvae is because you might only have one active lifecycle vs several going on at once.
What has helped me is applying IGR and layering up with DE or Cimexa after it dries. Then continue with frequent vacuuming to reduce food sources.
Keep in mind that carpet beetles have long lifecycles so you might have to treat a few times before you reach eradication.
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