Don’t put mothballs in the attic/odor elimination

Heat and ventilation will help as long as you remember not to blow air from the attic into the house. About a month ago, I put mothballs in my wife's closet and the closet still has an odor. Just give it time, each week it should get a little better. It will probably take 4 months though to be completely gone. And unfortunately, as the smell fades, its effectiveness against vermin will fade as well.

 

Thank you all so much for your kind advice. I am not a patient person but I see that I must be in this situation. There are moments that I laugh about it but I will never use them again.

 

I got similar advice many years ago, but it included an additional step of putting the moth balls in a used stocking to contain them and concentrate the odor in the area where the problem was. I put maybe a quarter of a box in one stocking, tied it in a knot, and tossed it into the far part of the attic where my then girlfriend was having issues with baby squirrels being raised over her master bathroom. The squirrels left, we smelled mothballs in the bathroom for awhile, and then the smell went away. She married me and the rest is sort of a happily ever after. Now that I've read this, I am grateful to who ever added the advice about the stocking. I think the secret here is containment and that if a little is good, a lot isn't necessarily better.

 

Wow, I rarely even lurk here anymore and had largely blocked that awful experience from my memory and was shocked to the the post!

J Gare - towards the end after lots of air circulation, I had great success by renting an ozone generator. There was a mail order company that shipped it to my door. It was probably the size of a small vacuum cleaner and you just plug it in after getting people, pets and plants out. Basically I would let it run over night, air the house out, and repeated over several days.

The devices are used by casinos, car detailers and restoration companies after fire damage. You can get them with different output levels and I would recommend something with maximum output (I forget how they measure).

I want to say it caused $150-$250 IIRC.

 

Fahrvergnügen

 

I wish I would’ve seen this thread sooner. I made the same mistake and now my family is paying for it. We’re going through one hell of a week.

I found someone who services attics for odor removal. He is coming in the morning. I sure hope he can help.

If there is anything else you’ve heard about this that could help please let me know! I’m glad this is all in the past for you!