How to get rid of bugs in flour and cereals. Ways to get rid of bugs in cereals Fear of the flour bug

Even the most responsible housewife can encounter insects in her home. No one is immune from purchasing cereals or dried fruits infested with pests. If “uninvited guests” are not eliminated in time, they may even appear on the floor and walls. Find out how to deal with bugs in cereals and how to prevent them from appearing again.

Small black bugs in the kitchen can appear due to the dishonesty of manufacturers who did not process the cereal according to all the rules, and as a result of non-compliance with the storage conditions of the purchased product.

Even buying buckwheat or rice in a tightly closed package will not provide a complete guarantee of safety; such cereals can also be contaminated with insects

Bugs can “move” into a container with cereal from neighboring jars on the shelf. Tea, dried fruits, pasta, flour, spices - all this can serve as food for insects.

Main types of kitchen pests

Small flour beetles

Brown beetles up to 3.5 mm in size bear offspring 4 times a year. Any cereals, flour and starch can be infected with beetles. Khrushchaki make the product lumpy and unsuitable for food.

Red mukoeaters

Mills and bakeries are common habitats for these insects. Flour eaters end up in the kitchen along with stale flour. The female flour beetle lays eggs in the cracks between shelves and in the folds of packaging bags. The insect reproduces 2-3 times a year, its life expectancy is 3 years. In the photo below you can see beetles in flour - mucoeds.

Bread grinders

This pest is 2 to 4 mm long, light or dark brown can eat more varied. Its menu may include: cereals, tea, flour, crackers, cookies, nuts, dried fruits, medicinal plants. When there are too many bugs, they can even be seen on the walls. If you have insects in your kitchen, photos with names will help you identify them.

Pests thrive in humid and warm environments

If you find sticky lumps, cobwebs, cocoons or larvae in bulk products, you can talk about moths entering the kitchen. This is what they call flour and granary moths. The moth butterfly does not feed on cereals; it needs the bulk product to lay eggs.

As soon as the caterpillars emerge, they spread throughout the kitchen in search of a place to create a cocoon.

Moths can quickly “take over” the kitchen area. Therefore, start fighting the “enemy” as quickly as possible.

Important! When purchasing cereal, pay attention to the integrity of the packaging and the expiration date of the product. If you have the slightest doubt, refrain from purchasing.

Pea weevil

The insect is very fond of beans, especially the white variety. The weevil climbs inside the grain, eating away everything nutrients.

To protect beans or peas from grains, dill seeds are placed in bags of legumes.

What are the dangers of contaminated products?

Many people ask the question: “Is it possible to eat cereals after removing the beetles from them?” Experts do not recommend preparing dishes from products spoiled by pests. During their life, insects leave excrement and shells of larvae in them. In addition, the beetles eat the core of the grains, and the remaining part becomes bitter and acquires bad smell.

Important! After eating spoiled foods, allergic reactions and stomach upset may occur.

Ways to control insects

If small bugs appear in the kitchen, you will have to start a big cleaning and look through all the cabinets, drawers, bread bins and cereal containers. Even if you liquidate visible insects, the larvae they deposit may remain in the cracks.

In the warmth home premises bugs from contaminated product in short time spread all over the kitchen

The cereal is heated in the oven for 20 minutes at a temperature of 60°C, and then poured into tightly sealed jars. When the cereal is heated, the beetles will die, but the unpleasant musty smell will still remain in the cereal. In addition, during such processing, vitamins and proteins of the product are lost.
Specialists in healthy eating It is recommended to leave a bag of buckwheat or rice in freezer for a few hours. If the cereal is infected with a pest, the insects will die, but the benefits will remain.
To get rid of bugs in beans, soak the beans in salt water and then rinse with water several times. The spoiled grains will float to the surface and can be easily separated from the whole and undamaged grains.
After identifying bugs, wash kitchen cabinets with water and laundry soap; it has disinfecting properties. Then wipe the surfaces with a vinegar solution. The cracks and latches of cabinets can be doused with boiling water.

Tip: to kill pests in hard to reach places insecticides can be used (all food products must first be removed from the kitchen).

By keeping your kitchen tidy and clean, you can minimize the risk of insects.

If there are bugs in the kitchen, do not hesitate to get rid of obviously spoiled products - they will not bring any health benefits. Be sure to carry out a set of measures to disinfect cabinets and shelves.

Prevention methods

Do not buy too much cereal, do not store it in plastic or paper bags. A glass or plastic jar with an airtight lid is the most suitable option for storing bulk products.
Place a pod of dry hot pepper or a couple of cloves of unpeeled garlic in each container of cereal - beetles do not like such smells. Some housewives add crushed clove powder to the cereal and wash the cereal before cooking.

It makes sense to keep dried mushrooms, rose hips, and beans in a vacuum jar for food storage

Place a linen bag with salt and bay leaf at the bottom of the container. Salt exhibits disinfecting properties and absorbs moisture. You can also use dry lemon peel or chestnut - all this repels insects.
Food pests do not like metal objects. Place a piece of food foil or a regular metal spoon in jars of bulk products.
Wipe down your kitchen shelves with vinegar from time to time. Don’t forget to dry the washed cabinets.
Use sealable glass or plastic containers to store bulk products.

Advice. There are also folk remedies for insect pests. Mix boric acid, powdered sugar and flour in equal proportions. Place the product on the shelves of the closet and in the pantry.

Where and in what should cereals be stored?

One of the reasons for the appearance of brown bugs in the kitchen is a violation of the shelf life of cereals.

Buckwheat, rice and noodles by weight can be stored for six months, millet grains - 3 months, corn - 4 months.
Flour can be stored on the shelf for a year, cereals- 7 months. Long term Shelf life of polished basmati rice is 18 months.

Properly prepared porridge is not only tasty, but also healthy. This statement is true only for high-quality cereals that are not infested with pests.

Semolina is stored in wooden containers or fabric bags with drawstrings. A glass container is suitable for rice. It is best to store oatmeal in a jar in the refrigerator. Buckwheat is dried in a frying pan and stored in a metal container.
Nuts and dried fruits should be stored in the refrigerator, not on a cabinet shelf.
You can also store buckwheat or rice in a linen bag that must be tied. Before use, the bag should be dipped in boiling water with salt (5 tablespoons of salt per 1 liter of water) and dried.

Important! Always throw away expired food items to prevent bugs from infesting your kitchen cabinets.

How to protect supplies from annoying insects

High humidity and high temperature optimal conditions for the development of any insects. Within a few days, bugs may appear in pest-infested cereals or flour made from larvae. Therefore, if your house or apartment has a dry and cool pantry, it is best to store bulk products there.

To prepare a tasty side dish or healthy porridge for her household, a good housewife always has a supply of cereals in her kitchen, which is stored in closed jars for bulk products in a dry place. Where then do insects come from and how to get rid of bugs in cereals if one day they appear there? In the kitchen, small black, brown, red beetles start up very easily, or rather, we ourselves bring them into the house from the supermarket with flour, cereals, starch, pasta, dried fruits or beans.

The reason for the appearance of small pests in food products lies:

in the initially poor special processing of grain in production, which should prevent the possibility of the development of living organisms in the grains and the laying of larvae;
irresponsible inspection by services at enterprises of the conditions of storage and packaging of cereals;
unscrupulous work of regulatory authorities monitoring the quality and service life of products, which must identify contaminated goods and not allow rejected products to be sold.

What kind of cereal bugs are there?

Most often, flour beetles, food moths, and, less often, bread borers and red flour beetles appear, reproduce and live in the kitchen. Grinders and flour eaters mainly live in enterprises.

Indian moth

The Indian food moth is a small (8‒10 mm), gray-brown striped and speckled butterfly that is a major pest in the kitchen. High humidity and poor ventilation– an ideal environment for the existence and reproduction of moths. Most often this midge is found in various cereals, flour, pasta, baby food, dried fruits, nuts, seeds, coffee. Insect larvae enter the house from food products, bought in a store. The butterfly is very hardy, resistant to low and high temperatures.

First of all, you need to understand that if you have food in your kitchen, then bugs can appear in any case, no matter how hard you try to maintain order.

Cereals receive bugs while still in the warehouse.

There may be several sources of infection:

Note! Even one spotted bug is a reason to be wary and take treatment and prevention measures. Therefore, carefully monitor the condition of your kitchen and do not neglect processing cereals after purchasing them.

In addition, many bugs love animal food, so it is better to put it in the pantry or refrigerator.

Types of bugs

It is important to understand that depending on the type of new kitchen inhabitants you have, methods of dealing with them may vary significantly. And sometimes they are not needed at all: for example, small (less than one millimeter) white bugs that can occasionally be seen in the kitchen are ordinary wood bugs. They feed on dust from your furniture, are non-toxic and do not harm human health.

White bugs: not a very pleasant, but harmless neighborhood.

True, there is another side to this - they can serve as food for other bugs with more unpleasant behavior. Therefore, we recommend that you read the information below and try to determine who you are up against and what products you may have to throw away.

We define: Musty smell and holes cut into the grains.

The mealworm is much more dangerous for humans. Brown bug up to three millimeters in size has a mustache and powerful mandibles. You can find it in stocks of flour or potato starch, but there are also not too whimsical individuals for which any crumbly product will suit.

Not only destroys food, but also harms health.

It is noteworthy that they do not strive to completely eat even their favorite flour - as soon as it begins to smell unpleasant, the entire colony migrates to the next container.

Their danger lies in the fact that the waste products of the flour beetle are dangerous to humans and can cause serious poisoning.

We define: Products collect in lumps and acquire a damp smell.

The peculiarity of the bread grinder is its incredible gluttony. The four-millimeter bug is ready to eat any food that can be found in your kitchen cabinets: flour and pasta, cereals, beans, coffee, tea, nuts, dried fruits and even tobacco.

A small bug can drain all your supplies.

There is no particular harm from it, but a few bugs can ruin a significant amount of stock.

We define: They usually don’t hide much, so they are immediately visible.

It should be noted that some people prefer to classify food moths as bugs in the kitchen. This is fundamentally incorrect: moths are a completely different species and need to be dealt with using other methods. We wrote more about how to get rid of food moths in.

Are bugs in the kitchen dangerous?

It is difficult to unequivocally assess the harm from the presence of bugs in the kitchen for human health: if you do not eat them directly, they do not seem to be able to do much harm.

Eating such foods is not only unpleasant, but also dangerous.

On the other hand, the taste also leaves much to be desired: bugs give all products an unpleasant musty taste, as they eat away their core, leaving only the shell.

The bugs will have no chance of getting into the container.

So get yourself some beautiful ceramic, metal or glass containers. In them, food will be preserved much longer, and bugs will not be able to reach it. Unless, of course, you forget to close the lid.

The desire to stock up is a good thing. However, should they all be stored in the kitchen? For most cereals best place storage will be a refrigerator or even a freezer.

Bugs cannot tolerate low temperatures.

Low temperatures will not give the bugs the slightest chance to reproduce, and will not spoil the taste of the food.

Place the selected ingredient in fabric bags and place it on the shelves between containers with bulk products.

It is not at all necessary to pour it into food: we doubt that this will make rice or oatmeal tastier. But once a week, wiping the shelves with a weak vinegar solution won’t hurt: this way you will remove the eggs and larvae of bugs, preventing them from multiplying.

Vinegar will remove bugs, larvae, and eggs.

Important! Be sure to wipe the shelves dry after treatment if you don’t want to enjoy the aroma of vinegar for a couple more days.

Scent bomb to fight bugs.

Step 1: Where there might be bugs in the kitchen

If your kitchen is already infested, the first step is to identify the source of infestation. To do this, you will have to review all products.

Radical methods will not be required if you listen to our advice.

Consider the following nuances:

After inspection, you may or may not find an obvious source of infection. Radical way- throw away all food supplies, clean the kitchen and buy new ones. However, not everyone will like this approach: products are expensive, so throwing away absolutely everything is quite wasteful.

Note! You still have to get rid of obviously contaminated cereals and groceries, so throw them away without sparing.

If any product is in doubt, heat treat it. You have two options.

If you bake cereal in the oven, the bugs are guaranteed to die.

The first one is the most gentle for taste qualities product. Just put the cereal in the freezer for a day and put it on minimum temperature. This will be enough for the bugs, larvae and eggs to die. Then carefully sort the grains and sift the flour through a fine sieve.

The second will take less time and is considered more effective: preheat the oven and pour the cereal onto a baking sheet. At a temperature of 50-60 degrees, keep it there for one hour.

However, reviews note that this method of fighting bugs has its drawbacks - the taste of the cereal will change slightly, and it will take longer to prepare. But you are guaranteed to receive crumbly porridge.

Be sure to sift the grains upon completion of cleaning work.

And yet, if you are not sure whether your products are clean, it is better to throw them away: it is much safer for your health to spend a couple of thousand rubles on restocking supplies than to later treat toxicological poisoning from frozen or baked remains of bugs.

Every thrifty and clean housewife may one day find uninvited “guests” in her kitchen in spices, cereals and other bulk items. Bugs can become a real disaster that destroys food supplies. Therefore, it is necessary to arm yourself effective recommendations and tips to quickly and permanently get rid of pests.

Reasons for appearance

Unpleasant insects appear on kitchen shelves quite quickly and multiply just as quickly, regardless of the amount of cereals stored. When pests are first detected, it is necessary to quickly take measures to destroy uninvited “guests”.

The most common way bugs get into food supplies is by purchasing food that has already been infested by these insects. Only such a winged pest as a moth can penetrate a home on its own.

Therefore, before purchasing cereals that are sold in transparent packaging, you should carefully study its contents.

As a rule, conscientious manufacturers, before packaging their products, treat bulk products with special compounds that destroy pests, if any. But not every company carries out a similar procedure with the product, due to which the products appear on store shelves along with insects. The risk of purchasing such flour, pasta or cereal increases many times over if the product is purchased in supermarkets or markets by weight.

This is due to the fact that contamination of products can occur from various products, for example, dried fruits or dried mushrooms lying nearby. IN separate category Spices that are at risk are not in the original packaging, but those purchased from private manufacturers, where sanitary and hygienic standards during production leave much to be desired. Under threat of defeat harmful insects there are opened bags of supplements that have been in the drawer for quite a long time.

Another option for bugs to enter a home is ventilation holes, hoods, as well as even minimal cracks in walls and floors, through which small bugs can easily enter the house from neighbors.

In order to promptly determine the presence of pests in products, you should pay attention to the following signs indicating the presence of beetles:

the presence of visually distinguishable lumps in the package of cereals;
stirring in a bag of pasta, porridge or flour;
presence of small holes on the packaging;
deformation of grains - holes appear on the grain;
living pests may be indicated by a specific brown coating on cereals and other bulk products;
the presence of long cobwebs in cereals and bulk cereals;
When examining a package of cereals, you can see grains at the bottom that have turned into flour.

If at least one of the signs discussed above is detected, you should immediately establish the type dangerous insect and take measures to destroy it.

Types of pests with names

Obviously, bugs appear only in places where there is access to food. Moreover, not only porridge in packages or bags, but also minimal remnants of cereals, spices or flour on the shelves can become a bait for them.

However, in cereal crops, seasonings and pasta infest not only crawling pests, but also flying ones. This applies to food moths. In addition to the usual cereals, these bugs do not disdain crackers, bread and sugar; in some cases, the uninvited “guest” can even be found in instant cocoa or coffee.

The number of insects dangerous to humans is increasing rapidly, and at the same time the level of damage to food products is growing. However, in order to remove the bugs forever, it is necessary to clearly determine its type, and based on this, select the appropriate means to combat it. To establish the type of pest, it is necessary to study the main ones. As a rule, kitchen shelves with supplies are dominated by bread grinders, food moths, red flour beetles and flour bugs.

The first variety has wings; usually the insects are very small and light in color. In most cases, they are found in baked goods, but can exist and reproduce in dry herbs, drinks and cereals. If a bread borer was discovered, we can safely say that they were infested as a result of purchasing low-quality products; sometimes the pest enters the house in loose pet food.

Bread grinder

Based on the name, you can guess that the flour bug, as a rule, lives in flour, but it happens that the insect chooses a pack of starch as its habitat. Infection of products occurs through the penetration of insects into packaging from other bulk products standing on a shelf at home or on the counter in a supermarket. It can be semolina, oatmeal or any type of flour. Sometimes the bug settles in buckwheat or dried fruits. Female insects prefer to lay eggs in the cracks of furniture or in the cereals themselves, so the spread of pests occurs very quickly.

Red flour eater – little bug, which ends up in the home if low-quality loose food was purchased for feeding cats or dogs. Gradually it settles in cereals or flour. Insects love spoiled foods, so they actively reproduce in bulk foods that are stored in improper conditions.

Flour bug

Red mukoed

The food moth looks like a gray butterfly; as an adult, the insect can have a body length of about 10 centimeters. The pest lives in buckwheat, semolina, flour and rice. Such pests are found in the kitchen for a reason: gross violations food storage requirements.

Without difficulty, moths can enter a home through ventilation or even opening windows and vents.

food moth

Methods of disposal

Today there are quite a lot effective options, allowing you to deal with uninvited “guests” in kitchen cabinets, so every housewife who is faced with a similar problem can choose the most successful method for herself. Of course, timely detection of insects in cereals increases the chances of a positive outcome. In addition, it is important to exterminate pests not only in the packages of grains and cereals, spices and flour, but also to treat furniture and nooks where pests could lay eggs.

First of all you need to remove all supplies from the cabinets and carefully examine the contents. This will help identify the main location of accumulation - the source of infection. If black or brown pests are present in single quantities, it is quite possible that the cereals can be preserved after special gentle processing of cereals, which will not cause harm to human health. These methods include exposure to products using high or, conversely, low temperatures, as well as sifting through a kitchen sieve. When large number beetles, the entire contents of the cabinets will have to be disposed of. .

The correct thing to do would be to hermetically seal the affected products and throw them away, but it is best to take them directly to the trash container so as not to store them in an apartment or house in a trash can, since bugs will again be able to reach the products from there.

All shelves in cabinets, as well as containers intended for storing cereals, must be subjected to mandatory treatment. This can be done using soap or soda solution, in some cases you can use a weakly concentrated solution of table vinegar.

Mechanical and folk remedies

Among the large list of methods to combat insects Several effective recipes should be highlighted.

Freezing. This method will only bring results in the case of a small cluster of bugs that entered the house not so long ago and did not have time to give birth. The essence of the method is to pre-sift the products, after which it is necessary to replace the packaging of porridge, pasta or flour and place them in the freezer for 15–20 minutes.
Using a microwave oven. Because this Appliances present in almost every kitchen, its use for pest control has been experimentally proven. The uninvited guest is destroyed by processing cereals in the microwave under high temperatures. To do this, bulk supplies must be poured into a special container for use in a microwave oven, and then placed inside for processing for 5–7 minutes. After the time has passed, you can check the result: if the bugs are still alive, then the processing time needs to be doubled. Next, the products should be sifted to get rid of larvae, eggs and the pests themselves.

Using saline solution. This method is suitable for killing beetles in legumes. The solution is prepared by dissolving two tablespoons of table salt in a liter of water, after which the product must be placed in a convenient container and filled with salty liquid. After some time, the pests will find themselves floating on the surface of the water.
Borax. Folk remedy, which has been in use for quite some time. It is completely harmless to humans, but is a real poison for pests. The use of borax involves the disposal of all contaminated bulk products, the treatment of shelves, after which the product must be placed inside the cabinets. You can prepare it as follows:
- crushed millet, borax and sugar, taken in equal quantities, are combined and rolled into small balls;
- the second option involves the use of dry yeast, sugar and borax.

In the first case, the poisoned balls need to be distributed among cabinets and drawers in the kitchen or pantry. The second method assumes that the product will be free-flowing, so it is scattered into small envelopes and also sent to insect habitats.

Use of boric acid. To prepare the composition, you need to combine flour, sugar and acid in equal volumes. The product should be placed on plates and placed in a closet.
Products that have a rich odor. Strong aromas are good insect repellents. The essence of use is to place citrus peels, peeled garlic cloves, bay leaf. You can use nutmeg as an aromatic, effective seasoning.
Using plants with rich aroma. Such crops include dried lavender, fir, rosemary or cloves. Instead of dry plants, you can use the essence and oils of these plants. This option is more pleasant from a human point of view, and as a poison for insects, the crops will help destroy all types of pests. As an option, it is allowed to use natural antiseptics, which are calendula and chamomile.

Professional chemistry

Along with folk and by mechanical means to combat insects in the kitchen, there are specialized store-bought formulations that will help with a large lesion, as well as when the above remedies did not bring the expected result and the bugs continue to destroy cereals and multiply.

Karbofos and Antizhuk are considered drugs that have earned a good reputation. The latter composition will have a complex effect, since it is capable of destroying not only food bugs, but also insects that cause harm wooden surfaces and furniture in the house.

Such work must include:

regular inspection and cleaning of the contents of the kitchen table;
timely disposal of expired products;
compliance with recommended storage periods and conditions;
heat treatment of purchased products, flour, pasta and other bulk products;
refusal to store bulk products together with dried fruits.

Should you eat contaminated cereal?

Some people, after finding a small number of pests in flour or porridge, sift them, heat them in the oven and use them for cooking. But, as experts advise, it is best to avoid eating such cereals, even washed and processed ones. This is explained by the fact that in the total mass there still remain products of decay and vital activity of insects, which in themselves can pose an even greater danger than a living individual.

Any product requires compliance the right conditions storage after release, as well as at home after its acquisition. The most the right option placement of cereals will be the use of perforated bags or glass containers with lid. Cans or boxes made of metal or plastic are considered good containers for cereals, flour or sugar.

More and more modern housewives are returning to our ancestors’ storage options for such products - buying or sewing special bags from natural fabrics. In such material there is good air circulation, and insects, as a rule, do not infest.

Most often, such bags are boiled in salt water, which helps repel and even destroy pests.

Should avoid purchasing large quantity bulk products, because the shelf life of cereals such as buckwheat or semolina is only six months.

However, the most important issue regarding storing cereals with minimal risk of detecting bugs in them is following the recommendations regarding storage periods, air temperature and humidity in the room.

To learn how to get rid of bugs and moths in cereals, watch the following video.

If bugs are found in flour or pasta in the kitchen, then we can safely assume that this food supply already belongs to insects. Regular sifting can remove adult insects, but the eggs of these beetles are so small that they freely pass through the holes of the sieve mesh, and in appearance they are very similar to grains of flour. If pests have managed to settle in products and kitchen furniture, then you will have to work hard to get rid of this scourge.

If you find “outsiders”—some bugs—in flour, you need to determine their type as quickly as possible and begin eliminating them

Most often, small flour beetles appear and live in the house, sometimes red flour beetles and bread grinders. The last two types of beetles usually live in industrial enterprises.

Bread grinders live in bakeries and bakeries, damaging dried bread products - crackers, crackers, biscuits, cookies. These are light brown small bugs, reaching sizes up to 3 mm. They fly well and at the same time are guided by light, so in apartments where these insects are found, beetles are usually found on window sills closed windows. In addition to their usual dried bakery products they can eat dry medicinal plants, tea, coffee, book bindings, animal feed and crushed grain mixtures. They are found quite rarely in apartments; more often they are brought in in bags with purchased food and pet food, from where they make their way to kitchen supplies.

The red flour beetle is an inhabitant of mills, feed and cereal factories, and bakeries. Prefers to eat rotten flour, grain or cereals. This pest cannot damage dry grain whose moisture content is below 15%. Once in an apartment, these small red bugs (up to 2.5 mm in length) most likely will not find suitable food for themselves and will die. The red flour beetle is usually introduced with low-quality grain feed for domestic animals.

Usually, flour beetles (flour beetles) take up residence in kitchen cabinets. This small insects 3-4 mm long, red-brown, slightly shiny. Most often they end up in the kitchen in bags of flour or starch, from where they spread throughout kitchen cabinets. Insects easily penetrate into loose closed boxes, bags and other containers with bulk products. They prefer to live in wheat, rye and rice flour, semolina and wheat groats, and rolled oats. Rice, buckwheat and dried fruits are less likely to be damaged. These bugs multiply quickly, eggs are laid in cereals, flour, on fabric, in the cracks of cabinets and tables, from where the hatched larvae crawl into food containers in search of food. The nutritional value damaged products are eliminated. Such cereals and flour can cause an allergic reaction in people, and in combination with mold fungi can cause poisoning. That's why, having discovered flour bugs, we must immediately decide how to get rid of them.

Freezing flour or cereal for 24 hours will kill harmful insects who settled in it

If there's an infestation in the kitchen flour bugs, they can be taken out.

There is no need to rush to get rid of products affected by barn pests. If the degree of damage is not great, then the cereal can be sifted out using a sieve and heated in the oven at +110 degrees. Processed foods should be used first.
Freezing food in the freezer for 24 hours will kill harmful insects.
Removing beetles and larvae from peas and beans is fairly easy. They are filled with salt water for several minutes. When the insects emerge, the water is drained, and the clean legumes are dried on a clean, dry cloth.
If food is severely infested with flour beetle, it should be thrown away, since eating it is not only unpleasant, but also dangerous to health.
If there are bugs in your kitchen cabinets or tables, you should first try to get rid of the eggs and larvae in the furniture. To do this, you need to empty the cabinets of containers and bags of food, sweep up all spilled flour and cereals and flush them down the toilet (they may contain insect eggs). Wipe all shelves with a vinegar solution (one spoon per liter of water), pour boiling water over the cracks. Wash jars for storing cereals and flour using laundry soap and pour boiling water over it. Fabric bags for storing flour products and cereals should be treated with a salt solution and dried without rinsing, pests will no longer lay eggs on them.
Sprinkle cabinet shelves (or place in fabric bags) with pyrethrum powder (obtained from Caucasian or Persian chamomile), which is sold in pharmacies. This drug is harmless to humans, but it is a deadly poison for mealybugs. Treatment is carried out at intervals of one to one and a half weeks.
You can remove pests with a simple bait. Must be mixed in equal quantities powdered sugar, fine grains and borax, place pieces of paper in the cabinets on which to sprinkle bait. This method will also not harm the residents, but will destroy flour bugs.

As a preventive measure, you should keep cabinets and tables clean and use airtight containers to store food. Periodically check cereals, starch and flour products for the presence of pests.

For obvious reasons, it is not recommended to use pesticides to kill beetles, especially since it is quite possible to deal with bugs in ways that are harmless to people.