Where Do Carpet Beetle Larvae Hide Inside a House?

What They Are Looking For

Keratin, darkness and stillness. Wool, silk, fur, feather, animal hair, dried insect remains — anything of animal origin — somewhere that has not been disturbed for a long time.

That combination is what makes the hunt predictable. Ask where in your house has both a natural fibre and no movement, and the list is usually short.

Inside Storage and Furniture

The floor of a fitted wardrobe, particularly the back corners. The backs and undersides of drawers. Boxes of stored clothing, especially anything wool that went away unwashed. Under and inside upholstered furniture, along the seams and beneath the base fabric.

Old wool blankets and duvets in an airing cupboard are a classic, as is a box of winter jumpers under a bed. If it is wool and it has not been touched since last year, look at it.

Around the Edges of Rooms

The carpet against the skirting and over the gripper, where debris and hair collect and nobody walks. Under heavy furniture. Beneath a rug that sits on a carpet, which is undisturbed on both surfaces.

Also underneath the carpet. Where a modern carpet sits on old felt or hair underlay, larvae feed on the underlay from below and the carpet looks fine until the damage is well advanced.

The Places People Never Look

A chimney breast, an unused fireplace and a boarded-up flue. Behind and under a radiator. Inside an old vacuum cleaner bag. In the accumulated fluff under a bed. In a dead bird or wasp nest in a loft or soffit. In bird nesting material in the eaves.

That last group matters most, because it is a source rather than a symptom. A bird nest in the roof produces larvae indefinitely, and treating the carpet under it every spring is a subscription.

What You Will Find If They Are There

Live larvae — short, stout, banded, bristly, curling up when disturbed — and, more often, their shed skins, which usually outnumber the larvae by a wide margin and persist long after the insect has gone.

Shed skins alone confirm the identification but not that it is still active. Live larvae, fresh damage or adults on the windowsills in spring say it is current. Treatment is £180 for the first room and £60 for each additional one, and the roof space needs dealing with if that is where the source turns out to be.