Of all the household pests that might invade your home, fruit flies aren’t the worst. They’re not going to poison you, they’re not especially disgusting to look at, and they’re scared off with the flutter of your hand—temporarily, at least. Still, they can make you feel a little ashamed, like you have an unclean home, and they’re certainly annoying.
How unpleasant to think about. Luckily, there are plenty of steps you can take to prevent fruit flies from settling in, to get rid of them once you have them, and to prevent them from coming back. Here are a few methods:
- Find the source
The first thing you need do is figure out where the flies are coming from. If they’re hanging out around any open food items, throw the food out and scrub the area clean. You can use any type of cleaner to disinfect the area. In some cases, removing their “home” can be enough to drive the fruit flies away.
- Clean common areas
After you’ve found the source of the problem, check out the drain in your kitchen sink. If it’s clogged or in need of a good cleaning, now’s the time to take care of it. Fruit flies like to live and breed in warm, damp spaces.
Don’t forget to check your trash cans for any signs of fruit fly activity. Fruit flies have been known to lay their eggs in trash cans, worsening the infestation.
If they’re swarming around your trash can or if you’d like to prevent such a situation, take out the trash and wipe down the can using a heavy duty cleaner such as bleach. Make sure the cans are completely dry before using them again.
- Use attractant products
Pestman fruit fly attractant is a mixture of food grade ingredients. The smell it emits is very attractive to fruit flies, luring them in for a short time and stopping them from causing damage to fruit and vegetables. Secondly, it is a green, non-polluting product.
It is non-toxic to humans, animals and crops and is very friendly to the environment. It has a long shelf life of 3 to 6 months and is effective against a wide range of fruit flies, such as the oriental fruit fly, melon fly and Mediterranean fruit fly, without affecting beneficial insects, making it extremely cost effective. If you need to treat both fruit flies and other flying insects, we recommend using our yellow boards in combination.
To use, pour 100-200 ml of Bismarck fruit fly attractant into a discarded plastic bottle and cut a 5*20 mm square hole in the side of the bottle, which has been experimentally proven to be more conducive to trapping fruit flies. Hang the bottle from a branch or tree trunk with a hook. In orchards, bottles should be hung 1-2 metres above the ground; in vegetable patches, bottles should be hung 1-1.5 metres above the ground; in other crop growing areas, bottles should be hung flush with the crop, with one bottle placed every 25-30 metres.
This product may settle, shake the bottle before use. The opening of the plastic bottle should be opened 5 cm above the liquid level. Hang the bottles in a well-ventilated area and out of direct sunlight. When there are too many fruit flies in the bottle or the attractant has evaporated, pour the attractant back in. Hang the bottles 1-2 weeks after the fruit and vegetables become susceptible to fruit fly attack and keep them up until the end of the harvest. Avoid contact with children.
