Silverfish Control Kits

Our kits come with a mix of products such as sticky traps, insecticide sprays, powders, and gloves. Check the individual kit page for exactly what is included.

Place traps in areas where you have seen activity (along skirting boards, behind appliances, in cupboards and storage areas) to monitor hotspots. Use the spray or dust in the locations stated on the label - typically cracks, crevices and dark corners where silverfish hide and travel. If using a dust, apply a light, targeted layer rather than overapplying. Wear the gloves provided, follow label instructions, and keep children and pets away during use and until treated areas are dry or secure as directed.

Suitability depends on the specific products in the kit, so always read the labels and use exactly as directed. Keep children and pets away during application and until treated areas are dry or ventilated, and place any dusts or traps securely where they cannot be touched, licked or disturbed. Avoid applying products to items pets may chew, or to bedding, unless the label specifically allows it. If you are unsure which option suits your household, choose the least intrusive method and target cracks, crevices and hidden areas.

Place traps along skirting boards and in quiet corners where silverfish travel - under sinks, inside cupboards, bathrooms, utility areas and storage spaces. If your kit includes a powder or dust, apply a light, targeted amount into cracks and crevices, behind units and around pipework as directed on the label, avoiding open surfaces and anywhere children or pets can reach.

Silverfish are flat, silver-grey, teardrop-shaped and dart quickly, usually at night in bathrooms and kitchens. Woodlice are grey, hard-shelled, oval and slow, and turn up near doors, air bricks and damp walls. Both mean damp, but the products differ - see our woodlice control range if that sounds closer.

Not much quickly, but it adds up in the wrong places. They graze on starches and paper: book bindings and pages, wallpaper and the paste behind it, photographs, labels, cardboard, and natural fibres such as cotton, linen and silk. The marks are irregular grazed patches and ragged edges rather than clean holes, which is one way to tell them from moth or beetle damage. They do not bite, do not carry disease and do no structural harm.

Two different pictures. If sightings are unchanged, the treatment has not reached the harbourage - silverfish shelter deep in cracks, wall voids, under baths and behind tiles, so a powder worked into those gaps does more than anything applied across open surfaces. If numbers fell and then recovered, the damp is still there and is refilling the space.

Possibly, and it changes what to expect. The common silverfish needs consistently humid conditions and fades away once a room dries out. Grey silverfish, sometimes called paperfish, tolerate much drier air, live longer and are spreading in UK buildings. The tell is persistence - if you have fixed the leak, improved the ventilation and they are still there months later, drying the room will not finish it on its own. Expect to keep trapping and treating the harbourage over a longer period.

Reduce the moisture, which is what keeps them alive: fix leaks under baths and sinks, run the extractor, ventilate the bathroom, and deal with damp in cellars or behind cold walls. Clear out old paper, cardboard and stored books they feed on. Leave a trap or two set afterwards so you find out early if activity restarts.

If numbers are still climbing after a full treatment cycle and you have already dealt with the damp, if they have spread through several rooms rather than staying in the bathroom, or if they are getting into stored books, documents or archive material you cannot afford to lose. Look for a qualified pest controller with BPCA membership.