Flies are a pesky fact of life both indoors and out, and when they start ganging up on you, a simple fly swatter just won’t do. Luckily, a good fly trap can capture hundreds of them with minimal effort on your part. There are, however, a few things to look out for on the way to making your home fly-free.
A good outdoor trap can benefit you indoors by catching flies before they cross the threshold of your home. Some are designed to get rid of most of the more than 110,000 known fly species by using bait to draw them into an opening at the top. Once inside, they’re trapped and eventually drown in the water below. The attractant is usually tailored specifically to flies, so “good” insects like butterflies and bees can continue to fly free.
When it comes to attracting flies, the stinkier the bait is, the better. Container traps often use bait ingredients with such a powerful scent that hanging them outdoors is a must. If you’re looking for something for indoors, the adhesive surface of many sticky traps don’t produce an overpowering smell, so they can be used on the sides of walls, vents, doorways and even on the floor. UV traps also work well indoors. They use ultraviolet light to ensnare flies before zapping them with an electric shock.
Fruit flies can be an especially hard pest to control. Since they lay up to 100 eggs a day, you need a particularly potent trap to keep them at bay. Some of the ones that get rid of these tiniest of flies work like the container traps, though with sweeter bait that leaves less of an unpleasant smell. Station the traps near common breeding grounds, such as trashcans, bowls of fruit and the kitchen sink.
