Had English Heritage launched Operation Clothes Moth on April 1 rather than April 6, it might have invited suspicion.
Members of the public have been asked to do many things over the years, but inviting them to keep tabs on the nation's clothes moths, those unwanted interlopers in our wardrobes, is a first.
It is hard to imagine the French or Germans doing something so exquisitely eccentric.
Moth alert: Members of the public are being asked to keep tabs on the nation's clothes moths
But there is method in the madness. Clothes moths are on the march, like a rampant new political party, and their numbers have doubled in the past five years alone, according to English Heritage, whose expert conservators have seen at first hand the destructive impact of moths.
The English Heritage mothcounters, who have been keeping tabs on the little blighters since 1997, are particularly concerned by the monopis crocicapitella, or pale-backed clothes moth, a species not previously associated with shredding cashmere pullovers, but which now seems to be baring its teeth.
