Museum Turns Moths Gay

Museum Turns Moths Gay

I am pretty sure that those four words have never been 

put together before in a single sentence.

(London Telegraph)  -  Sexually confusing moths might not seem the obvious solution to protecting your cashmere but it could be the most effective way to prevent insects from destroying clothes.

Moths have become increasingly difficult to control since a ban on pesticides which were blamed for the decline of bees.

But keepers at the National History Museum in London have come up with an ingenious solution after suffering a four year moth infestation which is threatening the fur and feathers of some of its most prized exhibits.

Now they are using a system which tricks male moths into thinking that other male moths are actually females in a bid to stop them mating and producing eggs and larvae.

And it does not involve killing any moths, merely confusing males into fruitlessly chasing members of their own sex and overwhelming their senses so they can no longer smell the females.

"It's called the Pheromone Destruction System and in simplistic terms, it makes male moth attracted to other male moths," said Armando Mendex, quarantine facility manager at the museum, who is heading the project.

"They only live for a couple of weeks and during that time there is only a small window in which they can reproduce.

"If they spend this unknowingly attempting to attract and fertilise male moths, then it reduces the offspring we are up against."

The system works by using a set of traps which a filled with the female moth pheromone.

The smell is irresistible to male moths who go to investigate and then become coated in the female love chemical.

As they fly away other males detect the pheromone and thinking they have found a potential mate, try and mate with the males. Although the system does not kill the moths, it prevents them from mating with females and so vastly reduces offspring.

Since the new system was introduced the Natural History Museum has seen the number of moths fall by nearly 50 per cent.

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Future museum docents?