A St.Catharines mom making pasta for her daughter got quite the shock when she noticed bugs floating in the water.
Trish Houtby, who used to work in quality control tells CKTB she purchased the dry pasta on sale this weekend from the Zehrs at the Fairview Mall.
The 900 and 750 gram packages of Italpasta were on sale for $1.99.
Houtby says she didn't notice the bugs until she went to boil the pasta today.
Houtby says she called Zehrs and they told her they would exchange the product and to call Italpasta and report the incident.
She says she was concerned that more wasn't done like removing the packages from the sale area.
CKTB reached out to Zehrs and management told us they would not be commenting.
We did have a conversation with a Quality Assurance official at Italpasta.
He says this is the first report they have received of bugs in the pasta in question, and they are responding quickly.
He says since the bugs were found in two separate bags, which are made in different areas of their company it is unlikely the contamination happened at Italpasta.
The bug seen in the picture is a rice weevil.
The Italpasta official says the bug is commonly found in rice products, hence the name.
The dried pasta bags do contain small holes to prevent the bag from popping, and the official told us the bugs can enter the packages thru the holes but they can also use their pinchers to enter the bag.
Officials from the Brampton, ON company are heading to the store to inspect the storage area of the pasta.
We asked Houtby if it's possible the bugs entered the packages in her home and she doubts it saying she looked in the area the pasta was stored.
The Italpasta official says you can usually see rice weevils in other products nearby such as rice.