Santé, Fruit Flies!

I’ve been having a fly problem this summer. Both lots of the regular big flies but that was earlier (they’re almost gone now) and these past few weeks fruit flies. I searched online and found all sorts of fly traps you can make; glass with various sweets (a fruit gone bad, balsamic vinegar, coke, “saft” etc) inside which entice flies, glass with paper funnel, glass with cling film with holes etc. Nothing really worked.

 

Until I realized that whenever I had a glass of rosé wine out those little buggers came and sat down on the rim or took a swim in my drink. So I took a glass, poured some rosé wine in it, added a couple of drops of dish washing soap (make them unable to land on the surface) and left it on the counter top.

At first nothing much happened but after a day or so I saw some casualties and after that they started piling up in there! There’s even a mosquito and a wasp so the wine turned vinegar must be really tasty now. A votre santé, creeps!

Comments

[Vanessa]

Yikes! They are a pain! I always prefer to store tomatoes, avocados, bananas, well most fruit and produce in room temperature and this time a year it´s... well you obviously have the same problem. Vinegar and soap has been my weapon but maybe I´ll try the wine as well.
Have a great and productive ;) wednesday.

[Susan]

August is always horrible for fruit flies. I agree with Vanessa, tomatoes and avacados especially are better on the counter. I will try your method and see how it works :-)

[Dolores]

Yes, they like wine and red wine vinegar. I keep an empty bottle with a bit of water and vinegar on the windowsill. The bottle helps them to get trapped.

[Leena]

Nice trick! I have been using that type of sticker that can be attached to a window. It work good with regular flies but fruit flies are not that interested in it. We also have a small carnivorous plant, which does not work at all :)

[Lorna from Atlanta]

"making them unable to land on the surface"? To which surface are you referring? The rim of the glass or the liquid inside? They have to land on the liquid right? A little confused here. What does the soap do? I have an image in my head of a soapy rim that makes them slip and fall into the wine. Cartoon style with them yelping all the way. Ha

[Ett stenkast från Fyndet]

Vinegar and soap works well for me. Interesting questions if HOW they just one day emerge in the kitchen. From like nowhere. How?

[jane]

Good one! I've had the same problem with flies. Like your experiment and observation style:) Will try this tip!

[Maria]

Here is a tip from my mother that really works: last thing you do in the kitschen in the evening is to pour boiling water in the kitchen zink and after that you pour any kind of liquid soap in the zink. Leave like that over night. By repeating this 2-3 nights you stop the flies to hatch new eggs. And yes they Heath there eggs in your kitchen drain, blähhh!

[Benita ~ Chez Larsson]

Fruit flies and mosquitoes can land on liquid such as water or in this case wine but the soap removes the surface tension so they go under.

[Benita ~ Chez Larsson]

Must try!!! And yes, blääh!

[Hxx]

Gross but useful, thank you!

[Zosia]

Fruit flies RIP or rather RIR (Rest in Rose). Good tip and the one from Maria above, too. Fruit flies of the world - be warned!

[Shelly]

A chefs trick to not only keep fruit flies away but to keep your fruit fresh longer at room temp is to store it in a microwave oven if you have one.

[Dorothy]

Along the same lines as Maria's tip: I live out in the country. When I moved here a new friend warned me she'd had problems with fruit flies at one time. A friend gave her this tip and she passed it on to me: Simply wash out your sink once a day with soap -- the same soap you might use to wash dished by hand.

I found her tip works well. I've had fruit flies the last couple weeks -- for the first time in the 2+ years I've lived here. And I realized I'd gotten lazy with my sink-washing habit. I washed out the sink last night, and I expect my problem will clear up in a couple days!

[Julia]

thank you for the tip, I am also fighting with those little bastards in my kitchen. I knew about the mixture of vinegar and soap, but I always thought that the soap would poison them in some way which I could not quite believe, so I never tried it. Now that I know I am gonna give it a new shot and hope for the best!

[Kasey M.]

Fantastic tip - hoping my new apartment is fruit fly free, but you never know!

[Erin]

Oof, I've only had fruit flies once, and thankfully I don't live in that apartment anymore. They were the worst! Impossible to get rid of, I wish I'd had this tip before. Thanks!

[m.e.]

she drinks! she thinks! So happy to learn the two are not incompatible!! skoal! i'll keep this in mind, but i don't have many winged insects in here, and I don't often buy rose wine, either.i'm sure the fruit flies would love spanish reds, though. the french have the reputation, but the spanish have the JUICE!!

[Lisa Flaherty]

Great tip! Thank you!

[Dana from CT]

My husband bought a riesling by mistake - I find it far too sweet to drink! But now I have a use for it. I am SURE fruit flies will love it.

And yuck about kitchen sink drain, but good to know.

As always thank you Benita and fellow posters :-)

[Luna]

Even if we don't buy fruit/veges we have a fruit fly problem. Then I realised our neighbour grows quite alot of fruit trees. I use a similar method too.

[Die Rabenfrau]

Take a bottle for this! You will catch more flies, and pour a little vinegar in your wine. And you won't see all the dead flies!
Hugs
Ursel

[MiaKvack]

Rött funkar ännu bättre än rosé! :-)
Jag brukar ta en skvätt vin, lite äppelcidervinäger och någon droppe diskmedel. Den sista skvätten som glömts kvar i glaset på fredagkvällen brukar få vara fälla hela kommande veckan... Jag använder ett litet glas som jag ställer bakom fruktskålen, då slipper jag se den men flugorna hittar dit utan problem. Blir det för många/för äckligt så byter jag ut blandningen mot saft+vinäger+diskmedel. Funkar inte alls lika bra som fällan med vin men det är ju inte precis så att jag öppnar en flaska bara för flugornas skull ;-)

[Amy]

Um, you might not want to know the answer to this...

You brought the fruit flies home with you on the produce in the form of their eggs. They propogate REALLY fast, so a few eggs quickly become a few flies, which quickly become many, many flies.

What works best for me is a bit of apple cider vinegar in the bottom of a glass, a drop of dishwashing liquid, and then plastic wrap over the top and several small holes poked into the wrap toward the center (so that the few buggers who don't initially land on the vinegar stay trapped inside until they do).

[elisa]

oh, that's very easy! and now i will wash my sink out a bit more religiously…but i am fond of the paper funnel variation. i made one. http://appleturnover.tv/homemade/2011/07/fruit-fly-trap.php

[emilie aka la marmotte]

hum... what a nice cuvée !
;-)
today for me is a fantastic day... the new white kitchen is ready !!!!!!!!!!
YEEEEESSSSSS !!!
:-d

bises from le terrier
la marmotte

[Michelle]

My mom did the same thing when I was a kid. She used a wine glass that had a narrower top than bowl and put sweet white wine in it (no dish soap). Flies would go in, get drunk, couldn't fly out, drown. I used it myself when I got the same problem about 6-7 years ago, worked great!

[Michelle]

How do you wash the fruit to get rid of the fly eggs but still make it eatable and non toxic for people?!?!? eep!

[Abigail]

I read this yesterday. I came home today to find my boyfriend setting four different types of traps so he could see which one worked best. So I told him your trick with the dishwasher liquid - and it's the clear winner!

[Erin @ The Great Indoors]

Great idea! If I ever had any rose in my house, I'd try this, too.