Tiny flies around my home???

[zxc]

Hi all, I'm having a bit of a nightmare with a load of tiny little flies around the house... but they have some very strange traits:

1) They all hang around exclusively on the join where the wall meets the ceilings (we have very high ceilings so they're easy to miss) - or they swarm around the ceiling lights (possibly due to the warmth?) 2) We have no house plants so cannot work out where they have come from or what is causing them 3) I cannot identify them (in order to effectively kill them)

Regarding no. 2, They seem to all be in the lounge rather than any other room - so I can't link them to food from the kitchen or from drains etc. The only thing I can possibly think of is that we had a large delivery of stuff in cardboard boxes a few weeks ago that sat in the lounge for a few days before we could ditch them - maybe they could have been brought in from a warehouse??

I would describe the little buggers as no more than 3mm in length and look vaguely like tiny mosquitos but with much shorter legs. These also do not bite - yet...

In an attempt to get these things identified I have attempted to take a photo of them - bare in mind these things are a bit shy and only 3mm long so this was no easy feat. The main shot is one of them on the top of my little finger to give you an idea of scale. Please look at the following:

would appreciate it if anyone could help ID them with a view to how best to combat them...

Thanks

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[The Natural Philosopher]

They seem to come in plagues for no obvious reason, and then vanish. "Mostly Harmless"

--but a puff of pyrethrum will proably make em pop their clogs if they bother you.

Don't worry about species extinction. They are not rarer. ;-) Don't worry about humane killing. They aren't human, either.

[Andrew Gabriel]

I would search around for a piece of rotting fruit or veg. Maybe something fell out of a bag and rolled out of sight some time ago?

[Angela]

For fruit flies get a bowl and put in something like cider vinegar or beer in plus some washing up liquid in it to break the surface tension (so that they drown when they land on it) and just leave it to attract the flies. Unless you get rid of the cause though they will still come back. There must be something somewhere in the room that is attracting and feeding them, look under your furniture for old food, mugs etc.

[TheOldFellow]

This often helps:

[MM]

bright, sultry days. However, a citronella candle (available from garden centres) works wonders. Mind you, the kind I get are even smaller than 3mm - more like .5 mm !! They are REALLY tiny.

MM

[Bob Martin]

overflow of the washbasin in the bathroom for 40 years. All attempts to wipe them out have failed.

[Andrew Gabriel]

I've got a few types of carnivorous plants around the house, and some of them pretty much work that way. Extremely effective at keeping flys down -- I never see any in the house now. I was concerned for a while if there were any flies for the plants to eat (they need them as their nitrogen source), but inspection shows they are catching them, effectively enough that I never see them anymore.

[Andy Champ]

Not to me. The classic scientist's fruit fly has a much fatter head.

All those doctorates I guess. :)

I'd go with a fungus fly, and as Angela said, hunt for something they are breeding on.

Andy

[Rod]

filter flies. Ended up being a drain problem - under the bathroom floor. I *think* the ones in your picture are somewhat larger - but suggest googling back over the last few years here.

[stuart noble]

Bird droppings possibly?

[Huge]

Just be glad you don't have to seperate them by sex. A process which involves anaesthetising them with ether (not too much, else they die) and separating them under a microscope with a fine tip brush. Before they wake up and fly away. There's a good reason many biology labs are infested with them....

Well, I have an insectocutor, but the various other suggestions sound good.

[Dave Liquorice]

A quick squirt of fly killer into the affected rooms will kill 'em off. Unless you can't get aerosol type fly killers these nanny state days, I last brougt some about 20 years ago to "do" the loft space each late spring to stop the annual wasps nest...

If they come back after a few weeks you then need to start looking for a source for 'em. Plenty of hints on that already posted.

They don't look like what I would call a "fruit fly"

the colour image there is of a red mutation the ones we get are black.

But more like some form of "mosquito" but it is hard to tell from the photo. Mozzies breed it still water, like a water butt, garden pond, bird bath etc.

[Doki]

Why would it matter if they die or not? I thought generally the way to do things was to kill it so that it's not moving about whilst you look at it ;).

[Stephen Howard]

They look rather like Whitefly to me...but either way I reckon you should be looking out for a mouldy potato under the commode.

Regards,

[Lobster]

Cos they don't tend to breed too well once they're dead - (research with fruit flies is all about genetics)

David

[Lobster]

Yep, when we had a similar problem it was tracked down to an extremely disgusting-looking (but surprisingly not foul-smelling) potato which had fallen out of the back of the veggie rack. Problem vanished as soon as the spud was dispatched.

David

[zxc]

Thanks all for replying to my original message...

Well after a long research session on the net I came to the conclusion that these 'may' be fungus gnats... if you have a look around google images, these are the closest thing I can find.

Having said that, that still doesn't seem to solve the problem. I attacked them with an antiseptic aerosol and some of my girlfriend's hairspray (her theory being that it was a bit sticky and it would stick their wings together!) - well we had no other alternative.

After squriting some of them, whacking others, wipeing some more and hoovering up the bodies and any last remaining blighters, they haven't been back and can see no more of them. This doesn't explain how they got there as that is still a mystery but at least they out of here.

p.s. Having pondered this isue for some time, we may have found the possible reason for them being here - we have a large fireplace with a burner and we have wooden logs next to it (in the lounge). Maybe as they're possibly fungus gnats, they came in on the bark of the logs?? - with the warm weather we've been having maybe they hatched or something... either way, thanks to everyone for your help!

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[Andy Champ]

it's many years since I had to do that (and got addicted to the ether...) but to me they don't look at all like Drosophila.

See this picture:

[Huge]

Naah, they aren't. But I wanted to tell the story... :o)