This is a very much boiled-down version of the original form of today’s question. Trust me, this is the short version. The original just went on and on and on.
People, let’s try to remember that brevity is soul of . . . um . . . well it’s the soul of something that is probably pretty good, so let’s try to keep them brief, shall we?
I have holes in my underwear. I bought new underwear a couple of months ago, and now I’m finding small holes in the material. The holes are usually very small, clean-cut and appear in both the T-shirts and briefs.
I know that moths, or their larva, eat material, but I haven’t seen any moths around, and my undies are either neatly folded in the drawer or in the clothes hamper or on my body.
The only bugs I’ve seen are small spiders and little black bugs. Do you know what these bugs are and could they be eating my shorts?
Should I get out the permethrin?
I wonder what permethrin is. It sounds nasty.
Anyway, I put this matter to good ol’ Carl Olson, renowned bug expert at the University of Arizona, alma mater of my two sweet patooties.
More important, he is chairman for life whether he likes it or not of the Valley 101 Well-I-Seen-Me-Some-Kind-Of-Bug-Whatya-Think-It-Was? Advisory Board.
In return for his services, Olson, just like all members of the various Valley 101 advisory boards, is invited to the annual all-expenses-paid gala Valley 101 Advisory Board Barbecue and Pie Jamboree at an exclusive resort high in the Colorado Rockies, an event that, unfortunately, has been canceled for the sixth straight year because of, um . . . rain, or the Black Death or something like that. I forget.
Anyway, without actually examining your underwear drawer, which I don’t think any of us want to do, Olson surmised that you are infested with some sort of dermestid, a variety of bug that includes larder beetles, hide beetles and carpet beetles.
They eat lots of stuff, and museums sometimes use them to clean bits of flesh off of skeletons.
You might try cedar blocks, he said, but your best bet probably is a thorough cleaning of your dresser.
These are tough guys.
Olson said he knows of someone who once found dermestids eating the rolled oats in rat poison with no ill effect.
Just like my masters.
Reach Thompson at clay.thompson@arizonarepublic.com or (602) 444-8612.
*Clay Thompson writes for The Arizona Republic. You can read his columns by going to www.azcentral.com
Clay Thompson 