How to get rid of bugs in cereals and flour

How unpleasant it is when you suddenly find strange insects in a jar of buckwheat and you have to throw away food. Usually housewives are upset that they overlooked and allowed spoilage of cereals or flour. Let's look at the main reasons for the appearance of bugs in bulk products and methods of dealing with this problem, proven in practice.

Why bugs start up in cereals

It is a mistake to think that bugs start up if you personally violate the sanitary standards for food storage. No matter how much you wash, clean or clean the kitchen, it is not up to you. They come to your house with cereals directly from the factories or plants where they were allowed to enter. The enterprises must perform special heat treatment of products at high temperatures, comply with the appropriate standards for its content, including the lighting and humidity of the room.

Even in vacuum packs purchased at the store, there may be livestock that moves from pasta, dried fruits, coffee or tea purchased by weight. The factories employ specialists who must clearly comply with the rules and procedure for processing future goods. Allowing such gaps, manufacturers only make anti-advertising of their products, which may result in losses for the enterprise.

What insects can be found in cereals

It seems to you that all the bugs eating your future porridge are the same, it was not there. See how many varieties can be found in cereal bags:

Red-haired mucoeater. Habitat - mills, bakeries and cereal factories. Flies eat spoiled flour or rotted grits stored in high humidity. The size of an individual reaches 2.5 mm. If it’s dry and warm in your kitchen or pantry, they won’t find decent food and will clean themselves from your home. If you find small holes in a sieve for flour, be sure that you have a flour-eater.

Bread grinder. Habitat - bakeries and bakeries. Grinders feed on crackers, biscuits, dryers, biscuits and other dry bakery products. Once in the apartments, they can eat dried herbs, coffee, even books, herbaria and tobacco. Very gluttonous. The size of one insect is up to 3 mm. These bugs move in flight, focusing on the light. In the process of finding food, they can be found on the windowsills, closer to the lighted area. Human consumption of products into which grinders have penetrated is fraught with gastrointestinal poisoning.

Floury Khrushchak. Settles in kitchen cabinets. If you accidentally bring a packet of flour with a pair of such bugs into the kitchen, they will quickly spread throughout the territory. Khrushchak’s favorite foods are wheat or rye flour, semolina, oatmeal, rarely buckwheat and dried fruits. The size of the insect reaches 3.5 mm. Khrushchaks lay larvae directly in the products or in the crevices of kitchen furniture, breed very quickly, bringing offspring up to four times a year. When they are found, foods can be thrown right away, otherwise they can cause a person to have allergies and even food poisoning.

Food moth. Being planted in larger products, such as nuts or dried fruits, it sometimes gets into cereals. The size of an individual of this butterfly reaches 10 mm. She can lay more than 350 eggs in two weeks of her life. Caterpillars then hatch from them, devouring any products they come across.

How to get rid of bugs in cereals and flour

Carefully read the following information in order to meet fully armed with this small, but dirty enemy.If you simply remove a bug accidentally caught in your eyes from cereals or flour, believe me - you have not completely solved the problem. It is necessary to carry out a series of activities in sequence:

1. Review all containers in which you store bulk products, cereals, flour, sugar, salt, tea, etc. If you find bugs somewhere, immediately discard this bag or contents of the jar.
2. The containers should then be thoroughly washed with soapy water in hot water and dried well. Sacks and plastic bags should be thrown away immediately, do not even try to wash them.
3. Put foods that are still out of suspicion in a freezer for a couple of days. This is done in case the bugs still managed to lay eggs in the croup, new offspring will not hatch from them at low temperatures.
4. Empty the kitchen cabinets and thoroughly wash them with disinfectants, you can use laundry soap with soda or vinegar, wash on all sides, penetrating into every crack.
5. The latches and brackets of the cabinets can be flushed with boiling water. Then let the furniture dry well, at least during the day.
6. Shelves of dried cabinets are lined with clean paper or newspapers, on which cloves of garlic and bay leaves are laid out, you can lay out twigs of dry lavender.
7. Newly purchased cereals, flour and other products must be stored in metal or glass containers, which are tightly closed with lids. Paste pasta in boxes, be sure to pour it into jars. For prevention, you can put an unpeeled clove of garlic in a jar, it does not emit a strong smell, but bugs will not start.
8. Buy bulk solids in small portions, but more often. Then, in any case, the bugs will not have time to settle in your products.
9. Try to keep the kitchen dry and warm, and high humidity is the best environment for various harmful insects.
10. Periodically look through products in lockers to in time to find a bug accidentally penetrated into a grits. If something has been stored with you for more than a year, this is a clear candidate for throwing away.

How to prevent the appearance of bugs

Every housewife should understand that it is better to create intolerant conditions for bugs in the kitchen than to bother with their destruction for a long time. There are few such rules; remember the most important of them:

1. Cereals purchased in a store should be dried immediately in an oven at a low temperature for no more than 20 minutes;
2. It is necessary to scatter products in glass or metal containers, tightly closed with lids;
3. Do not store a lot of food on a rainy day, periodically update your set of cereals, flour or sugar;
4. Put garlic cloves or bay leaves in jars with loose substances, all types of bugs do not tolerate their smell;
5. Store nuts and dried fruits only in the refrigerator in tightly closed jars;
6. Wipe the kitchen furniture at least once a week, especially the one where cereals are stored, with vinegar diluted in water;
7. When buying groats or flour in a store, pay attention to the production date, do not take expired products even at very big discounts;
8. Keep humidity in the pantries and in the kitchen.

It would seem that there is nothing difficult in avoiding the appearance of bugs in products. However, every mistress at least once in her life met with these pests. Defeating them is not difficult, all the means are at your fingertips, just do not lose your patience, the real woman does not care.

Video: how to store cereals so that there are no bugs and mold