Shoo, Flies, Don’t Bother Me!
This is a Quick Tip, but it’s not related to Flash or any other software. Has nothing to do with computers, in fact. This is about how to catch fruit flies — whole bunches of ’em, with barely any effort.
I have no idea where our fruit fly infestation came from, but man, oh man, are they annoying. Let’s just say they have boundary issues. Whole swarms of them will suddenly be in your face — in your face! — and they’re too small to swat, but big enough to drive you mad.
To solve this aggravation, dig out a few wine glasses. Find some Saran Wrap. Grab several pieces of juicy, fragrant fruit, like banana, pineapple, or cantaloupe. Place a small piece of fruit into each glass, slap a sheet of Saran Wrap overtop, and poke holes through the wrap with a fork.
This is the same principle as a lobster trap: the fly smells the fruit, can’t help but find its way in, and then for the life of it (literally), cannot find its way out. Brilliant!
July 5th, 2006 at 5:51 pm
Here’s a variation on the same idea: instead of fruit, put a quarter cup of vinegar (or beer) in the glass with a few drops of liquid dish soap. The fruit flies are just as attracted to vinegar as they are to the sugars from the fruit (vinegar is basically made from spoiling fruit). The dish soap is lethal poison to them so you can eliminate the plastic wrap if you want but it does help to contain the odor. The benefit to this method is you won’t have spoiling fruit in the glass and the flies won’t escape when you decide to clean out the trap.
July 6th, 2006 at 2:04 pm
Ooh, I like!
December 13th, 2006 at 6:52 pm
if you have a fish tank, rescue those flies prior to their death and throw them in your fish tank, preferably after stunning them. your fish will love them.
December 14th, 2006 at 3:12 am
Hiya, kglad!
Welcome to my humble abode.
The closest thing I had to a fish tank was a small frog tank that sat on my desk where I used to work. That frog kept me company for over six years! When I started working from home, I transferred the tank to my living room. Frog managed to climb out one night and secretly explore the living room.
I finally found it a couple weeks later, completely dried out. That was the end of an era. I’ll bet the frog would have liked those flies, too.
December 28th, 2006 at 11:59 pm
When the flies are at my house (usually in the summer when I have consumed fruit and I don´t want to empty the trashcan because it´s not completely filled yet) I just open the thashcan, kick it a few times so all the flies come out, take the vacuum cleaner, remove the mouth-piece and suck them up. They never come out again.
Fast, clean, odorless extermination of those pests.
Ofcourse you could devise a gauze-like structure inside the hose and feed the flies to the fish later.
BTW, I like your site. unfortunately I don´t have much to contribute to the AS part, as I´m too much a newbie in that part.
In case you use the glass, you could fill the glass with water and feed the flies to the fish once the flies have disappeared into the glass, although that would introduce the fruit to the fish water as well, so you´d have to filter the flies/fruitwater first (easy if they´re in a gauze-covered glass, just move the gauze over the glass-opening to where there are no holes in it. Make sure you only use the liquid part of the fruit-juice.