• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • DYEING
    • Eco Printing and Eco Dyeing
    • Yarn Dyeing
    • Fabric Dyeing
    • Natural Dyeing
  • FELTING
    • What is Felting? A Beginner’s Guide
    • How to Needle Felt (for Beginners)
    • Wet Felting Tutorials
    • Needle Felting Tutorials
    • Fiber 101
  • PATTERNS
    • Pattern Roundups
    • Free Indie Crochet Patterns
    • Free Indie Knitting Patterns
  • CRAFTS
    • Home Crafts
    • Holidays
      • Christmas
      • Easter
      • Gift Ideas
  • E-BOOKS

FiberArtsy.com logo

menu icon
go to homepage
  • DYEING
  • FELTING
  • CRAFTS
  • PATTERNS
  • E-BOOKS
  • search icon
    Homepage link
    • DYEING
    • FELTING
    • CRAFTS
    • PATTERNS
    • E-BOOKS
  • ×

    Wool Moths in Your Clothes, Yarn or Wool? Now what??

    Updated: Dec 7, 2021 by Annette Browning

    Disclosure: This page may contain affiliate links. If you click and buy, we may receive a commission.
    See Disclosure for details.

    How to get rid of clothes moths in your wool sweaters and how to prevent them from infesting your stash in the future

    Whether you are storing wool clothes, yarn or raw fleeces, clothes moths can be an ongoing problem. Once you see a moth or two, you can be sure there are plenty more!

    But, not to worry because I am going to give you some tips for storing your pieces properly and how to get rid of wool moths if you do get them.

    3 images: Wool yarn, a pile of sweaters and a sheep
    In this Article:
    • What are Wool or Clothes Moths?
    • How to Prevent Wool Moths
      • Wash wool items before storing
      • Treat Pre-owned Items
      • Store Wool with Cedar Hangers or Balls
      • Store Items with Rosemary, Lavender and Calendula
      • Double Bagging
    • Are Mothballs safe to use?
    • How to Get Rid of Clothes Moths
      • Freezing
      • Washing
      • Moth Traps
      • Solar Heat
    Raw alpaca fiber in a plastic bag
    (Raw Alpaca Fiber is highly susceptible to wool moth infestation)

    You may be interested in How to Wash Wool Without Felting It!




    What are Wool or Clothes Moths?

    They are small tan or gray colored moths which feed on wool fibers such as sweaters, socks and yarn or felt. They are about 1/2 inch long and shaped like a thin triangle.

    These little insects will lay their eggs in your clothes so that when the they hatch, the larva have something to eat, your wool! Then the larva grow into moths, lay more eggs in your wool and the entire cycle repeats itself.

    Wool or Clothes Moth
    (Image courtesy of Wikipedia)
    a pile of wool sweaters
    Photo by Tanya Trukyr on Unsplash



    How to Prevent Wool Moths

    As the saying goes “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure” and this also applies to insects in your wool stash.

    Protecting your clothing from moths correctly in the first place can save you a lot of headaches trying to get rid of clothes moths later.

    While this is certainly not an exhaustive list of prevention techniques, you will find some easy and affordable things you can do at home.

    Wash wool items before storing

    Make sure to thoroughly wash everything before long term storage. (This includes raw fleeces as the wool moth eggs may already be in unwashed fiber)

    Treat Pre-owned Items

    One way to get rid of moths and their larva is by freezing them. So, get in the habit that anytime you bring home used clothes from a thrift store (or yarn and fiber), seal it in a bag and pop it in the freezer for about a week.

    Store Wool with Cedar Hangers or Balls

    Cedar wood is a natural bug repellant and works great to keep moths out of your clothes or yarn stash.

    I have personally used prunings from my cedar trees but you can also purchase Cedar Hangers, Planks and Balls to keep in your closet.

    Note: make sure and check the labels of any moth deterrents you purchase as many times they are nothing more than chemicals and not natural cedar oil.

    Store Items with Rosemary, Lavender and Calendula

    Bugs in general do not care for strong smelling herbs and flowers. Hanging dried bundles of these can help keep them out.

    Remember to refresh your herbs occasionally as the smell fades over time.

    Another option is to hang some pillows or sachets with drops of Lavender, Rosemary essential oils in your closet.

    a bunch of lavender flowers

    Double Bagging

    When you get ready to store your sweaters or wool yarn for the long term, double bag them in heavy duty plastic bags. Or better yet, store them in vacuum sealed storage bags.




    Are Mothballs safe to use?

    While mothballs may keep the wool moths out of your clothes, keep in mind that they are made of chemical insecticides. So, what you smell, is actually toxic chemicals that you are inhaling.

    Therefore, I do not recommend you use mothballs in the clothes you plan to wear. In addition to that, the smell is very difficult to remove from yarn and raw wool so I would not store any fiber with mothballs.

    A more eco friendly alternative to mothballs are cedar hangers, balls or chips which naturally repel moths.

    Remember when people used to keep their blankets and other linens in a cedar chest? Wool moths are reason why. They don’t like the smell of cedar.

    a pile of natural colored yarn
    (Photo by Nicole Parker on unsplash)



    How to Get Rid of Clothes Moths

    So you took all of the precautions and stored your wool sweaters and fibers carefully but you still end up with moths. What to do??

    First, you need to figure out where the moths are nesting. Are they in one closet only? How about your yarn stash?

    Carefully examine each piece and look for moths, dead moths and little cocoons. These are small tan colored tubes.

    Once you find the infested item, get it away from your other clothes or fiber stash to prevent further damage.

    Take it outside and look at the item very carefully.  In some cases, it is not worth salvaging and you are better off to seal it in a plastic bag and toss it in the outside garbage can.  

    If it is worth keeping, here are a few suggestions:

    Freezing

    Place your clothes moth infested item in a sealed plastic bag and place it in the freezer for about a week. Basically, this will kill the moths and larva however, there are a lot of differing opinions about whether or not freezing kills the eggs.

    Washing

    Wash your piece of clothing or yarn/fiber as you normally would but using HOT Water. I would also suggest several washings.

    Moth Traps

    Moth Traps are sticky traps that attract the moths by using their pheromones. Personally, I have had some success with moth traps in the my pantry.

    Note thought that they work great to trap adult moths but are useless against the eggs or larva which will go on and hatch.

    So, you may want to remove the eggs and larva first and then the traps. In other words, treat your wool item with one of the other methods (freezing or washing) and then place traps to catch any adult moths which may have escaped notice.

    You may need to do this treatment more than once to ensure that you got all of them.

    Solar Heat

    What is hotter than the Sun? Simply, place the item with the little critters in a black garbage bag. Close it up tight and put it in the bright sunshine for a few days.

    To be honest, I have not tried this method personally, however, I do a lot of solar dyeing and if it gets hot enough to set dye, it is bound to be hot enough to kill the clothes moths.

    Note to fiber artists … if you were planning to have that fiber processed at a mill, you will need to contact them first. Many mills will not accept a fleece that has any evidence of moths.

    a white wool sheep with sheep in the background
    (Photo by Sam Carter on Unsplash)

    Keep in mind, that you can do everything right, take all the steps you can take to prevent moths from infesting your things but nothing is really fool-proof. Sometimes they get in there anyway so don’t despair.
    Good Luck!
    Annette


    Related Wool & Felting Articles:

    • How to Scour Wool Without Felting It
    • Make Your Own Wool Dryer Balls
    • What is Felting? A Beginner’s Guide
    • Basic Wet Felting
    • Needle Felting for Beginners
    • Learn Nuno Felting
    • How to make Cobweb Felt
    • Easy Lattice Felting
    Marketing image of a sheep, a moth and text

    Wool Moths in Your Clothes or Yarn? Now what??

    Sharing is caring!

    45 shares
    • Share

    About Annette Browning

    Annette is a long time fiber artist and former alpaca farm owner. She shares her love of dyeing, felting, crochet and knitting as well as other craft projects.

    Reader Interactions

    Comments

    1. Ellie says

      June 19, 2013 at 1:52 pm

      Thank you for bring this up! I even go as far as to put my finished needle felted pieces in the freezer every now and then just in case I get a moth infestation. It sure is heart breaking to see an outbreak of the little pests.

      • kentuckybluefiber says

        June 19, 2013 at 3:20 pm

        Great idea Ellie! Prevention….

    2. Candace says

      February 08, 2014 at 9:26 pm

      We use the Alpaca & Llama Insect Spray (natural spray) has cedar oil in it. You can get it at http://www.alpacasALLnaturale.com or Quality Llama Products.
      We spray a light spray across the fiber of the open bags after shearing & before we close up the bags of fiber to store. It repels moths and kills any lavae & makes the eggs hatch premature killing eggs. Any alpaca products we store we spray using this natural spray. I have a friend that makes rugs and she sprays the rugs before she rolls them up for storage or shipping. I use it to spray in cedar wardrobes & cedar chest to repel moths. It’s a great product & safe to use.

      • admin says

        February 09, 2014 at 5:48 pm

        Great info, Candace! I assume it smells like cedar? Does the smell fade over time?

        • Candace says

          February 09, 2014 at 8:45 pm

          The smell does fade over time. It is not overwhelming.
          I use it in our alpaca shop to spray around hats, socks, scarves, etc. that are displayed on racks & shelves to repel moths. It works really well.

          • admin says

            February 10, 2014 at 6:37 pm

            That’s great. I’ll have to give it a try. Thanks for sharing!

    Primary Sidebar

    WELCOME! We share tutorials for Dyeing Yarn and Fabric, Natural Dyeing, Eco Printing, Felting, Knitting and Crochet Patterns as well as Crafts.

    • Facebook
    • Instagram
    • Pinterest
    • Twitter
    • YouTube

    Footer

    stay connected

    • Facebook
    • Instagram
    • Pinterest
    • Twitter
    • YouTube

    What’s New!

    two images of jars with dyes and dyed fabric
    image of fabric and yarn tie dyed with turmeric powder
    three jars of dye and a dyed fabric


    FELTING         DYEING         PATTERNS        CRAFTS         E-BOOKS         RESOURCES        ABOUT      DISCLOSURE      ACCESSIBILITY STATEMENT        PRIVACY POLICY       


    As an Amazon Associate, this site earns from qualifying purchases by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.


    Affiliate Advertisements: This site participates in various Affiliate Programs. This simply means that if you click through an affiliate link and buy a product, we may get a small commission, at absolutely no extra cost to you.

    Copyright © 2022 FiberArtsy.com on the Brunch Pro Theme

    45 shares