Hidden threat within the stately homes of England

Curators warn priceless fittings across the country are at risk from the growing plague of moths

WITH its priceless Art Deco interiors Eltham Palace has been described as a masterpiece of modern design. However, its ornate furnishings and fittings now face a small but deadly threat – the household moth.

The insect poses a growing problem for historic homes such as Eltham, a former hunting lodge of Henry VIII that was restored and redecorated in the Thirties by the Courtauld textile family.

English Heritage, guardian to many historic buildings, has been forced to start putting furniture, carpets and curtains through a special heating process to eradicate the moths, after they emerged from a void in the wall behind a sofa in the palace’s boudoir room.

Curators at the house, which has provided a backdrop to period dramas such as Brideshead Revisited and Poirot, discovered an infestation by the pale backed clothes moth (Monopis crocicapitella) whose larvae feeds on woollen carpets, clothing, upholstery, fur and stuffed animals.

Amber Xavier-Rowe, English Heritage’s head of collections conservation, said: “They can eat through centuriesold carpets, tapestries and clothes in a matter of months ... the warmer weather has not helped and in the last five years the number of clothes moths we’ve captured in our traps doubled.”

The charity spends £1 million a year on cleaning its properties and its collection of 500,000 historic artefacts, and it has a dedicated team to spot and eradicate moth infestations. “If we stopped cleaning our properties now we would see a huge amount of damage from moths within 12 months,” Ms XavierRowe said. “It’s a constant battle.”

Other properties to have fallen foul of the moths in the past include Brodsworth Hall, in South Yorkshire. It is one of the most complete surviving Victorian country homes in England but its carpets, rugs and delicate soft furnishings and linings were found to have been severely damaged when English Heritage took it over in 1988.

English Heritage, which reopened many of its sites to the public this week after its annual spring-clean, also hopes the survey will help researchers build a comprehensive database of the moth population, helping them find ways of tackling the problem.

Although small, the moths are visible to the naked eye and can be counted. Those taking part in the survey can post their results on the English Heritage website and the information will help it decide where to concentrate its efforts in future.

Visitors to the charity’s properties are now being asked to take home a free cardboard moth trap impregnated with the female clothes moth’s sex pheromone to attract and catch males. Additional reporting by Archie Osmond.