How to Get Rid of Grain Weevils In Your Pantry
One Saturday morning, years ago, we awoke to a rather horrifying sight: hundreds of little brown bugs pouring out of the pantry cupboard and across the kitchen floor. We’ve encountered ants, pantry moths, and grain beetles, but this was a new one for us. We did some research and learned that our new guests were grain weevils (aka wheat weevils).
How to Prevent and Eliminate Grain Weevils
To prevent grain weevils, inspect all grains upon purchase and freeze grains for at least 1 week (or store permanently in the freezer) to kill any eggs. Buy grains in small quantities and eat within a reasonable period of time. Store grains in tightly sealed glass, metal, or sturdy plastic containers (not bags). Regularly clean pantry cracks, crevices, and shelves. Small bags of black pepper placed around the pantry may also help repel weevils.
To get rid of grain weevils in your pantry, discard any infested foods, vacuum pantry shelves, cracks, and crevices. Wipe shelves with white vinegar and dispose of garbage and vacuum bags outside, away from the home. Check regularly for reappearance — it may take awhile to get rid of them completely.
What Are Grain Weevils?
Grain weevils are pantry insects and before they multiply, learn how you can prevent them from invading your pantry. Due to past insect problems, we’re diligent about storing all foods in glass jars or plastic zip-top bags. Unfortunately, grain weevils (Sitophilus granarius, also called granary weevils or wheat weevils) can chew through paper and plastic packaging. That’s how they got out of the bag of wheat berries we had bought and into the rest of the kitchen.
But how did the weevils get there in the first place? You may want to skip this part if you’re squeamish, but we think it’s actually quite fascinating.
How Do They Get in the Kitchen?
A female weevil lays an egg inside a grain kernel. (She can do this up to 254 times!) The egg hatches and for one to five months depending on the season, the larva lives inside and feeds on the kernel as it grows. Upon reaching adulthood, the weevil emerges from the kernel to mate — and look for new grains to invade. We’re kind of amazed to think of this process taking place inside a bag of wheat berries that, get this, we had purchased six months ago. That’s right. The bag sat there for six months before we had any problems.
How to Prevent and Eliminate Grain Weevils
Our fascination aside, we definitely did not want it to happen again. So we also looked into how to eliminate and prevent grain weevils from taking over our pantry.
How to Prevent Grain Weevils
- Inspect all grains upon purchase.
- Freeze grains for at least 1 week (or store permanently in the freezer) to kill any eggs.
- Buy grains in small quantities and eat within a reasonable period of time. (We certainly learned our lesson with this one!)
- Store grains in tightly sealed glass, metal, or sturdy plastic containers (not bags).
- Regularly clean pantry cracks, crevices, and shelves.
- Small bags of black pepper placed around the pantry may repel weevils.
How to Eliminate Grain Weevils
- Discard any infested foods. Grain weevils can bore through plastic and cardboard, so inspect everything thoroughly. (We chose to be safe and got rid of everything that wasn’t already stored properly.)
- Vacuum pantry shelves, cracks, and crevices.
- Wipe shelves with white vinegar.
- Dispose of garbage and vacuum bags outside, away from the home.
- Check regularly for reappearance — it may take awhile to get rid of them completely.
Have you ever dealt with grain weevils? Let us know how you dealt with them in the comments below.