About this time of year, fruit flies start inundating our kitchen to take advantage of, well, fruit, and the accompanying juice and peelings we're more likely to have out and in the garbage in the summer. Short of removing all traces of food from the kitchen (unfeasible) or resorting to fly tape (ugly), we lit upon this technique for getting rid of the things:
Get a wide-mouthed jar out of the recycling, and put about an inch of vinegar or wine (red works best) in it. Curve a piece of paper into a funnel with a half-inch opening at the small end, taping it to secure the shape. Stick the funnel in the jar.
Hi new poster here! I recently used this method to get rid of the flies that magically appeared in my place. And while it worked, I noticed this: 1- not all the flies will go in right away so you'll need to leave it out a few days, and 2- after a few days they'll start hatching new flies in the glass jar. You can avoid the grossness by tossing it out after a day or two and then putting up a new one.
view PYT's profile
I used this same trick last year. I found apple cider vinager worked really well and I taped the funnel to the jar to prevent escapes. Whenever I saw flies in there I'd swirl the jar to drown them.. I didn't want the little guys to suffer unduly.
view mgn's profile
I also noticed that when we finish a bottle of red wine and leave it open on the counter, they are drawn to it. When I dump the contents out the next morning there are usually 4 or 5 of the little things in there. I like to think they die drunk and happy.
view SittingInATree's profile
Something better to do with your scraps than throw them in the garbage is to compost them with a worm bin. It even works in apartments! Because it has a sealed lid and you close everything in with newspaper, you have less big explosions of flies.
https://www.stopwaste.org/AlamedaCommerce/ProductList.aspx?View=Detail&ProductId=14
view kendralis's profile
add some soap or detergent to the vinegar and it will decrease the surface tension allowing those lovely little drosophila to drown in the vinegar, wine, or, dare i recommend, beer.
i used to work in a fruit fly lab.
view sciencegeek's profile
What I use is:
About half a cup of water, a splash of apple cider vinegar, and a drop of dish soap.
Within a day most of the flies are gone, and they definitely do not hatch in this soapy water mix.
view kmswann's profile
Yep, apple cider vinegar and a drop of dish soap works wonders.
view jussipoika's profile