We have ridiculous numbers of flies in our kitchen. We kill them by the hundred with the fly swat (they are quite easy to kill) but their numbers don't seem to be reducing. We have an electronic zapper baited with a bit of ham fat. We have fly killer window stickers. We have a home made bottle trap with inverted top to make a funnel, baited with pieces of chicken in it. Their numbers just keep increasing. We keep all doors and windows shut as much as possible. I've had a look outside to see if there are any dead animals about but there aren't and there don't seem to be many flies out there!
The traps don't seem effective. Is there a better bait to use?
May seem like a daft question, but do you live in the town or country? We live in the country, with a corn field just over the back fence, and we were plagued with flies and insects for about three or four weeks before they took the corn off. Within a few days of the farm workers harvesting, the number of flies dropped quite dramatically.
You also mentioned dead animals. Have you noticed any unpleasant smells about the place recently? Do you have cats? They have a habit of bringing in livestock that can creep under fridges, etc and then die.
We also invested in a 'Boots' plug-in fly killer, that comes with a bottle of insecticide that lasts for quite a few days.
What sort of flies? There are many species all with different habbits and food requirements. If possible post a picture on a website somewhere and give a good indication of size and a description of their flying habits, noise etc. Pop the URL into the group.
A UV (blue light) thing doesn't need any bait the light attracts the flies. But not all...
You've only used bits of dead animal. Lots of flies prefer fruit.
There must be a food source in or near the kitchen. Rotten bit of fruit behind the fridge, back of the vegitable cupboard? Rotting spuds are really liked by some flies but the pong would probably have alerted you first...
There was a TV news item about plagues of flies being caused by farmers spreading slurry in th erecent heatwave. A pub had lost virtually all of its food trade. One of the pleasures of living in/near the countryside I guess.
I had a similiar experience in a rented house. We had lived in it for a year when blue bottles started appearing by the dozen.
1st u could try and determine if they are coming from inside or outside the house. Close all the windows and doors, kill all flies then wait and see if more appear.
In my case we finally pulled out the fridge and found a "nest" stuck between the back of the fridge and the wall, about 2 ft off the ground. The fridge was under a fitted worktop so nothing could have slipped down the back, we still don't know where it came from. It was 'orrible, gave me the heebee geebees.
Similar experience when on holiday in rented farm cottage. Flies suddenly crawled out the woodwork in the early evening. Only seemed to be in one room (mine). Tens and tens of them, maybe up to a hundred. Fly killer didn't kill them (I *think* they were the black houseflies you get - like bluebottle sized but not blue), even trapping some in a jam jar and squirting neat killer on them just dazed them, they were flushed down the loo, and were still alive and floating on the top when it finished flushing...
Never did find out where they were coming from, but sounds like similar woudl have been possible. Shut all the windows and kept the door shut all day - loadsaflies. Kept them open - loadsaflies. Thick swarms of them everywhere in the room each evening.
Worst holiday of my life, I was a teenager and it's left me very jumpy when flies buzz close (I was told to put up with it and go to sleep regardless, since nothing could be done, and not allowed to sleep anywhere else, to my horror).
I'd go with removing EVERYTHING from the room they're in. Everything out of cupboards, move all the appliances, if you can, check behind worktops etc, under floors. Flies tend to get drowsy in the dark, and re-activate when a light it turned on. Takes a while, but you might find that going in at night and shining torches into spaces behind cupboards will start flies into coming out if there's a group of them behind there (may take 5-10+ minutes).
On second thoughts, given black houseflies die with fly killer I have here, maybe the ones in that holiday home weren't houseflies. They looked like them, but it was years ago now (though the memory of that room with the flies covering everything still is a clear if yesterday).
Holidays on a farm where they keep animals can be expected to suffer from this. Even if they don't have animals they spray crap on th eland which attracts them. Once had a French gite near to cowsheds. It was horrible. The flies were much tougher and than normal ones too.
This is probably it. They spread a load of sh*t all over the field behind us (ex rapeseed crop) on the hottest day of the year (Sunday
10th Aug). What is the breeding cycle of these things? About 10 days?
The only odd thing is that they only enter the kitchen, no other rooms in the house despite having no windows or doors open. Could they get in via the aga's flue? (It's switched off)
Obviously the kitchen has food in it but there are no nasty smells that I can detect. We try to keep it clean as possible, put rubbish out regularly.
By the way they are what I would call 'ordinary flies', ie: not as big as a blue bottle or a horsefly but not the tiny ones either. They do die with flyspray. They don't seem wildly attracted to fresh fruit or meat (we have no rotten stuff). Some of them are a little smaller - maybe juvenile versions of the larger ones.
We bought some flypaper yesterday, this has been the most effective trap.
"The traps don't seem effective. Is there a better bait to use?"........
There's part of your problem, the 'bait' you are using is just attracting more flies in, as is the UV light. Get rid of both and straight away there will be a *slight* difference. Cleanliness is most important, ok not saying your'e fodder for 'life of grime' but how often do you empty the kitchen bin (and wash it afterwards)? Also do you leave any dog/cat food out in bowls? My advice is to get rid of any potential foodstuffs and smells and stick with the flypaper, you can also spray residual crawling insect killer on surfaces where the flies alight, although this will only kill those entering the room not prevent them from doing so. If it's really, really bad then you should consider flyscreens for the doors and windows. I could go into great detail about correct placement of UV flykillers along with the selection of the correct tube wavelength for each species of fly but I suspect that would bore most people senseless.
Not at all, placement would be interesting. Tube wavelength might be a bit irelevant as I don't think there is a choice for most domestic "insecticuters".
comes in variants of a variety of languages, with Japanese and German the most common. I'm told that some of the early Japaenese ones border on the obscene, though most of the Japanese I know are far too polite to comment.
Only stupid farmers would consider spreading slurry in hot weather as it burns the grass. It needs to be cool and preferably rainy. Or that's what my Dad used to do anyway.
One of ours is spreading onto pasture. The grass ain't growing now anyway, so won't unduly suffer from being spread on. And when it does rain he can no longer get a muck spreader onto that field without seriously damaging the ground.
Seems to me the above was "a little bit of knowledge".
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