The Bo-Kaap climbs up the slopes of Signal Hill above the city centre, with brightly painted houses, cobbled streets and the oldest mosque in South Africa on Dorp Street. Homes here are packed close together and often very old, so pests like rats, cockroaches and pigeons move easily from one roof to the next.
Stored product pests around Bo-Kaap
Spice shops, bakeries and home kitchens that cook in bulk for family gatherings are prone to weevils, flour beetles and pantry moths. Spices and flour kept in airtight jars stay clean far longer.
Most homes are flat-roofed terraced houses from the 18th and 19th centuries, many with thick walls, old timber beams and small backyards. Flat roofs and parapet walls give pigeons places to roost and nest. Shared walls and old drainage pipes let cockroaches and rodents travel between neighbours.
Rats from the CBD and old drains are a major issue. German cockroaches are common in older kitchens and in the growing number of guest houses and cafés. Pigeons on flat roofs and fishmoths in damp walls are frequent complaints.
Worth knowing
Freezing is underrated. A few days in the freezer kills eggs and larvae in flour, rice and grains without affecting the food.
How to tell you have a problem
- Insects collect in the folds of packaging or along the seams of sealed boxes and bags.
- Small moths flutter out when you open a cupboard, and rest on the ceiling at night.
- Silky webbing clumps cereal, nuts or pet food together, sometimes with small caterpillars inside.
- Grains of rice or maize have tiny round exit holes, or the bag has fine dust at the bottom.
Infested food is contaminated with insect bodies, cast skins, droppings and webbing, and it has to be thrown out, which adds up quickly for a bakery, mill or food distributor. A single infested bag can spread to the rest of a pantry or storeroom, so losses grow fast if nobody checks. For manufacturers and exporters, an infestation can mean rejected consignments, failed audits and customer complaints. Some stored product beetles also cause damp, mouldy pockets in bulk grain, which encourages further spoilage.
How the treatment works
The first and most important step is finding and removing every infested product, because no treatment works while the insects still have food. Shelves, cracks and crevices, and the gaps behind and under cupboards and racking are vacuumed out to remove spilt product and eggs. We then apply a targeted residual treatment into cracks and crevices, and an insect growth regulator where the pest is a moth or beetle that keeps cycling through. Pheromone traps for moths and beetles go in to monitor for survivors and new arrivals. In warehouses, mills and food factories, larger infestations of bulk commodities may need fumigation, which we plan and carry out separately under the right controls.
Want the full step-by-step? See how our stored product pest control service works.
Keeping them out afterwards
- Put new bags of flour or grain in the freezer for a few days if you have had weevils before, which kills eggs inside.
- Buy dry goods in amounts you will use within a month or two, rather than letting big bags sit at the back of the cupboard.
- Store birdseed and pet food away from the kitchen, as these are common sources of pantry moths.
- Move flour, rice, cereal, pasta and pet food into sealed glass or hard plastic containers as soon as you get them home.
- In commercial stores, rotate stock on a first-in, first-out basis and keep pallets off walls so you can inspect behind them.
Pricing, honestly
For homes, the cost depends mostly on how big the pantry is and how far the insects have spread into other cupboards. For commercial sites, the size of the storage area, the type of commodity, the level of infestation and whether fumigation is needed all affect the price. Food businesses that need regular monitoring and audit paperwork are usually best on a service contract, and we quote free after an inspection.
In a home pantry, throwing out infested food, a thorough clean and sealed containers fixes most problems, and we will happily talk you through that over the phone. Spraying insecticide in a cupboard full of food is a bad idea, so please do not. Where you need a professional is when the insects keep returning after a clean-out, or when you have a commercial store, bakery or factory where losses and audits are at stake.
Frequently asked questions
Do I have to throw everything away?
Throw away anything infested and anything open that is close to it. Unopened tins and sealed jars are generally fine once wiped down.
Why do pigeons like Bo-Kaap flat roofs so much?
The parapet walls and flat roofs give them sheltered ledges to roost and nest. Netting or spikes on parapets, plus clearing nests, usually move them on.
Are Bo-Kaap's old houses more prone to wood borer?
They can be, because many still have original timber beams and floors. A proper inspection will show whether the beetles are active and what treatment is safe for heritage timber.
Can I spray inside the pantry?
We would not recommend it. A thorough clean-out and sealed storage do more, and any residual treatment should be targeted into cracks, not sprayed over shelves that hold food.
Do you come out to Bo-Kaap for stored product pest control?
Yes. Bo-Kaap is part of our regular City Bowl & Atlantic Seaboard route, along with Malay Quarter, Schotsche Kloof, De Waterkant, City Bowl. Most bookings are done within about 48 hours, and after-hours visits can be arranged.
Where did these insects come from?
Usually in a packet of food bought already infested, often in small numbers you could not see. They then spread to other products in the cupboard.
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