Fruitflies.

[jillan]

Anyone else have them?

Jeez - they are all over the place by my compost pile....which is just a few feet from my garden.
My compost is in a container, so they must be having wild orgies inside of the container.

I have tried a homemade trap where you take a 2 liter soda bottle, cut the top off and invert it into the bottom so it's like a funnel - poured oj and a rotten strawberry in it, along with some water.... and those little f'n pests just fly right by.

Anyone else have any other way to get rid of them?

[XemaSab]

1. Why do you want to get rid of them?

:shrug:

[jillan]

2. My garden is about 3 feet away from the compost maker, and I don't

want them attacking my fruits and vegies.

Plus, they find their way into my house. Pretty gross when you have a cup of coffee and look in it to see a dead fruitfly. yuck.

[HamdenRice]

3. I had a serious fruit fly problem the last 2 years

This is during the summer and early fall, so it's not happening now. For me, it's a little more complicated than that the compost harbors fruit flies. It does, but then the problem spreads to the kitchen (which is far from the pile) where there are fruits and veggies from the garden. Since the tiny garden produces more than we can eat, there are often a few veggies that unknown to us are going bad, and that's where we find the flies.

I have found it's possible to be scrupulously clean in the kitchen such that there are few flies indoors. Also anything fruity that goes in the pile in the warm months is covered with soil. These measures reduce the problem.

You mentioned in another post that you don't want the flies attacking your veggies in the garden. This is one of the most amazing things to me, and maybe an insect expert can chime in, but fruit flies never seem to attack living fruit and veggies. They seem to know the difference between a tomato on the vine and a tomato that's been picked. In fact, they don't seem to care for fruits or veggies that have only been off the vine for a day or two. I think it has something to do with the gases that fruits and veggies give off as soon as they are picked and begin to decay. They like rotting stuff (even if we don't recognize a 4 day old tomato as rotting). Just another garden miracle -- that fruits and veg and flies seem to "know" more about each other than we can imagine.

[Kolesar]

4. Mosquitos can detect CO2 and use that to home in on us mammals

(Or so they say.) Maybe it is a similar homing mechanism.

[bvar22]

6. We get the indoor fruit fly problem too.

...especially when canning tomatoes.
It is really annoying as we are near OCD about cleanliness and sanitation.
WE don't alloy any chemical toxins on our hilltop, especially in any area that has anything to do with our food.

The best way we have found to deal with them are sealed containers, and THIS:



We originally bought it for removing Squash Bugs and Cucumber Beetles from our plants in the garden.
Since then, it has become a versatile tool in the kitchen for sucking up fruit flies.
The narrow nozzle of the front folds upward opening a bigger mouth.
It has a very strong suction, and can suck up a whole cloud of fruit flies in an instant.

We also get many mud daubers and wasps inside during the Summer. The Dirt Devil is good at removing them too.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=246x8830

[japple]

7. If the fruitflies are in your kitchen, you can put out a

jar with a little balsamic vinegar in it. They will be drawn to it and drown. I have to change mine about every week during the late spring, summer and early fall, but it has worked very well for me.

[jillan]

9. I never heard about the balsamic vinegar.

Thanks - I will try that when they start getting in the house.

[Kittycat]

5. Move your compost pile to the other end of your yard.

This is one of the reasons why I don't have one, because it would have to be up close to the house and my garden. I live on a small lot, and I'm just grateful to have a nice garden - so we do without the compost - and I buy it instead.

[hippywife]

8. My other half solved our fruitfly problems last summer.

He took one of those plastic clamshell containers like berries or grapes come in (find one with no holes in the bottom. Actually, now that I think about it we used an Earthbound Farms lettuce clamshell that has no holes at all and poked some in the top.)

He put some water and dish soap in it (not suds, just drizzle it on top of the water and distribute around gently with your finger.) along with a rotting banana peel that would have normally be headed to our compost pile.

The peel attracts them better than the cider vinegar traps we made the year before. The soap on the water breaks the surface tension and they drown because they can't stay afloat.

We also let a frog who had gotten in the kitchen stay:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=236&topic_id=48584

She's still with us. :hi:

[jillan]

10. I like the frog idea!