How to Get Rid of Fruit Flies

Have you ever had problems with fruit flies? If so you know what a pain in the neck they can be to get rid of. I often get them because I have little kids who love fruit but somehow manage to leave morsels behind when they are having their little snacks. Here are a few ways to get rid of thees pesky critters. Obviously, first of all you need to remove the food source and breeding area. Really what you need to do first is make sure you have a clean house so when you start to get rid of them they don’t just keep coming back. A fruit fly can hide and breed in many different areas, such as dishrags, wet dishes, dirty drains, and of course in your trash can. Just think like a fruit fly and think about where you might have some fruit juice splatter, ketchup spills, or anything sweet that a little tiny fruit fly can find. You can look and look and look for the source of these little guys, so your best bet is to just do a thorough cleaning of the whole joint.

The first trick to getting rid of fruit flies is using a bowl trap, what you do is put a piece of old fruit and some wine or fruit juice in a bowl and cover tightly with plastic wrap. Poke some holes in the plastic wrap with a fork, by doing this the flies will get in but will not be able to get back out and die. Do not make the holes too big and you also don’t need thousands of holes, a few here and there is fine.

The next one, and my favorite is the funnel trap. You make a cone out of a sheet of paper like a funnel, then you tape the outside of the cone so that it stays in place and make sure that the funnel fits snuggly in a glass or cup. Pour a small amount of wine or fruit juice in the cup and insert the funnel but don’t let it touch the liquid. The flies will go down the funnel and into the bottle not being able to find their way back out, this one works good and it’s also entertaining to watch.

Finally here is a real easy one that I don’t find to work exceptionally well, but it is somewhat effective. Get a plastic zip lock bag and put a piece of fruit in it then zip it up leaving about 1/2 an inch open. The flies will fly in and surround the piece of fruit, then you can zip up the bag and discard the bugs. This one allows the bugs to come and go as they please which is not real affective, but is does work fine if your paying attention.

Again cleaning up is the first line of defense, if you’ve ever had these little guys hanging around, you know that they can be extremely hard to get rid of. I hope this will help some people with a simple problem.