This week I got to play around with a new pest control toy: A microscope. As I peered through it for the first time, I finally began to feel what professors of microscope-peering fields of study must always feel—an instant IQ boost. With my additional IQ, all sorts of possibilities flashed before my previously dim view: World peace, curing world hunger, and the NEXT best thing since sliced bread. Sadly though, it went away just as instantaneously as it came. Now here I sit, all 150 points of me.Now I’m contemplating comparatively trivial things, like the adult Carpet Beetle I took a picture of with my new handy dandy microscope. Normally not much bigger than the point of a pencil head, this little guy (or girl) looks huge while under magnification:
This carpet beetle is most likely a Varied Carpet Beetle, one of the most widely distributed of the carpet beetles in the USA, and certainly the one we come into contact with the most here in the Boise area.
These insects are scavengers. They feed on non-synthetic fabrics, animal hides and antlers, feathers, hair or fur, even other dead insects.
It has been our experience that they seem to often be getting their meals from pet hair, most times at or near hard to sweep or vacuum areas where pet hair has accumulated (like by baseboards, etc.) Because of this, they are often observed crawling up the walls, which is exactly where I spotted this fella.
We’ve also seen them many times in closets, eating peoples wool, silk, or cotton clothing. These same folks may sometimes find small holes in these fabrics, courtesy of these hungry insects. Animal taxidermy is also sometimes at the dinner plate of Varied Carpet Beetles.
The good news is that they are easily controlled. Treatments are available to quickly and safely rid your home of these insects. To aid in the process, make sure to clean up pet hair as best you can, discard infested clothing, or maybe even discard the elk mount above your bed (I know, an interior design faux-pax).
After that, a phone call to Barrier is all you need. We will take you the rest of the way, with all of the IQ we can muster!
