Pest Control

This month Beacon Compliance have teamed up with Graham Turner, National Pest Technicians Association (NPTA) technical support, biologist and trainer (www.linkedin.com/in/grahame-turner) to bring you some juicy insights as to what could be crawling behind your bakery equipment panels.

Bakeries, due to the nature of the raw materials and finished food products, as well as the complex machinery with lots of awkward-to-clean cavities, are attractive habitats for numerous species of pests. Rodents, birds, insects and mites can all thrive in niches within bakeries. A pest control contract manager at a bakery needs to have an awareness of the pests and an understanding of integrated pest management practices. Likewise, a contractor carrying out the pest control at a bakery requires a thorough knowledge of the specialized bakery pests as well as an understanding of the specialist operations and machinery used in baking. The partnership can then establish an effective, pro-active, tailored, monitoring, prevention and control program.

In terms of insects, different pests can be found at different stages of the bakery production process. Examples of the insect pests that can be found in bakeries:

Flour moths. The larvae of these happily feed on flour and in grain-based residues. They produce webbing, which can cause machinery blockages.

Flour beetles. These are most likely to be found living in flour but can also be found living on finished products.

Biscuit beetles. The 2mm diameter holes in biscuits and solid food items can indicate where adult biscuit beetles have tunneled out from a food item, the larvae having fed and grown within. They can infest many different food products.

Spider beetles. These are general debris feeders and can be found in a wide variety of locations feeding on a range of spillages.

Booklice. Spillages that are allowed to accumulate under equipment and machinery could allow some mould growth. This can provide a food source for booklice.

Besides these species, there are many more insect pests that could be associated with residues in machines, deposits on ledges, bird nests on the roof, damp areas, storage areas etc.

Mediterranean flour moth webbing on a motor in a bakery

Mediterranean flour moth webbing causing blockage in a bakery machine

Blockage removed from bakery machine (the one shown above) showing pupae and webbing of Mediterranean flour moths

Mediterranean flour moths breeding on residues inside a bakery conveyor

Confused flour beetle tracks in flour residues at bakery

Spillage from sack of sunflower seeds where it has been gnawed open by brown rats

Monitoring for Pests

It is important to inspect the site regularly for signs of pest activity. Visual observations by a pest specialist are important. To aid the inspections, there are monitoring tools such as pheromone moth or beetle traps, crawling insect detectors, electric fly killers and rodent monitoring blocks that pest technicians can use to help detect and pinpoint pest activity over a wide area before the pests become established. In order to be confident in your choice of pest contractor, ensure you use a reputable pest control company that practices intelligent Integrated Pest Management and has sound procedures and documentation in place e.g. one that is an Accredited Member of the National Pest Technicians’ Association (NPTA). 

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