Varied Carpet Beetle Food

Adult carpet beetles live both outside and inside homes.

Varied carpet beetle food.

Carpet beetle larva feeding on a wool sports jacket. Concealed areas e g cuffs collars fabric folds are often preferred. Once found infested items and susceptible articles nearby should be laundered dry cleaned or discarded. The varied carpet beetle anthrenus verbasci is a 3 mm long beetle belonging to the family dermestidae they are a common species often considered a pest of domestic houses and particularly natural history museums where the larvae may damage natural fibers and can damage carpets furniture clothing and insect collections.

The life cycle of a carpet beetle ranges from two months to several years in length. Remove old spider webs and bird rodent bee and wasp nests which can harbor infestations. Shed molted skins of carpet beetles associated with mice nesting in an attic. Most carpet beetles develop up to four generations yearly while varied and black carpet beetles develop only one.

Eliminate accumulations of lint hair dead insects and other debris that serve as food for carpet beetles. Larval food sources play a significant role in determining the duration of a carpet beetle s growth cycle. Verbasci was also the first insect to be shown to have an. Carpet beetles don t usually eat cotton linen or other plant based or synthetic fabrics but they may eat fabric blends or fabrics stained with animal products.

Outdoors they are found on the blossoms of crape myrtle spiraea queen anne s lace buckwheat daisies wild asters and other. In the varied carpet beetle the head end is narrower than the tail end a characteristic that distinguishes it from black carpet beetle larva. They often eat along the edges or.