Where the hell are all these boll weevils coming from?

In My Humble Opinion
1

And why won’t they go away? AUGH.

While doing our kitchen remodel, we placed boxes of various non-food cabinet contents in the garage. While unpacking, I started noticing all of these tiny dead bugs in the bottom of the Pyrex dishes and such. Huh, I think, and leave it at that after running said dishes through the dishwasher during unpacking.

Hubby later comments the bird seed he keeps in the garage had all these little black bugs in it. Huh, I think, that must be what got in the boxes of pots and pans. Then I think nothing of it.

Later, I take out a mixing bowl. Three dead little bugs in it. Ew. I wash it, thinking maybe I missed it.

I start cleaning out my office (two rooms away from the kitchen) and find an old pretzel stick behind the trash can. It is FULL of little bugs. That did it–to Google I went, where I identified them as boll weevils. I remembered having them in the bird seed I would sometimes buy for my parakeet as a kid, so I recognized them.

Now I keep finding them in random places–the counter (alive), a scented candle (dead), and just now in the dust pan after sweeping up the floor (dead, alive, and pupae). WTH? My understanding is they’re an agricultural pest, so what the heck do we have in our house that they’re after, and where the HELL are they all coming from?

Cereal boxes? Bags/boxes of chips? Bag of potatoes? Rice? Crackers? No, no, no, no, and no. I figure they must be feeding on something in the kitchen after presumably being brought in from the garage, but…what?

And why the HELL won’t they go away? Ick. I can feel them crawling in my hair already.

2

Are you sure they are all Boll weevils, and not Strawberry Weevils? Around here, (Minnesota) Strawberry weevils (pure black) get into houses and find their way into all the smallest crevices they can. In our old house, they were found in every crack in the old plaster. Here, I have two inside a framed picture.

They are common around soybean fields, but head for buildings. This year doesn’t look too bad, because the local fields are in corn.

3

Boll weevils aren’t house bugs. They only feed on cotton bolls. You may have a different type of weevil though, as suggested by the post prior to mine.

4

I got weevils in my cabinets last year, I think they came out of a bag of fifteen-bean soup. They drowned themselves in my scented candles, too. I threw out what was infestible, and I try to keep open, grain based stuff (rice, noodles, etc) in a ziploc bag.

5

Oh, de boll weevil am a little black bug,
Come from Mexico, dey say,
Come all de way to Texas,
Jus’ a-lookin’ for a place to stay,
Jus’ a-lookin’ for a home,
Jus’ a-lookin’ for a home.

This is sheer poetry. Or maybe lyrics to a Ry Cooder song.

6

{Takes a bow}

Thankya, thankya very much

7

Strawberry root weevil, I believe. We get 'em here in Michigan a lot, too. I’ve read that they come indoors during hot, dry weather to escape the heat and look for water. Indeed, we find them almost exclusively in the kitchen and bathroom, sometimes in the toilet or shower; they do seem to know where the water is.

Last summer the weather suddenly turned cool and wet, and just as suddenly, we stopped finding them in our house.

8

To the OP-Thank you for posting this dilemma. I have a similar issue. It makes no sense to me that these outdoor pests are coming into my home although I have seen less that a half dozen of them. I remembered purchasing some organic barley that was sealed until our ferret chewed a small hole in it. I just checked the package and nothing. In fact no pests in the pantry at all which is unusual since palmettos are generally in most older coastal homes here in Wilmington NC. We moved in about 2 weeks ago. So far not much of a scare but I would like to eradicate the problem before it becomes any bigger. Maybe they are in due to a sudden cold snap? I try to be eco friendly but I want them gone! They are freaking me out!

9

As noted these are almost certainly not boll weevils, but rather some cousin - a stored product weevil of some sort, like Rice Weevils or Maize Weevils or Wheat Weevils or some other member of their huge extended family.

Respect the mighty weevil. They are literally the most diverse animal family on the planet with ~40,000 species :).

They probably still have something to eat. I’d go through every single grain-type product you have from pretzels to pasta and toss or beetle-proof all of it. Or toss it all and beetle-proof the new stuff. And you should know that nothing guarantees beetle-proofness, as all it takes is one batch of nearly-invisible eggs somewhere to start a brand-new colony. Stored product pests are incredibly good at what they do, which is being pesty to to the rest of us.

At work we once had a colony emerge from an ancient and abandoned box of off-brand mac and cheese in a cupboard. The box looked like it had been riddled with tiny machine-gun fire.

Try reading this general wiki section on stored product pest prevention and eradication.

10

It’s Halloween. You are suffering from a manifestation of Unspeakable Weevil.