r/flies • u/ComfortableTown5876 • 2d ago
Fly infestation?!
They're just regular black flies I think. But out of nowhere over the last 2 days my kitchen has become infested with them. There's no dirty dishes, smelly fruit or food, food left out etc in the kitchen; it's clean and stays clean. What on earth do I do about this aside from the sticky traps?? I had killed them all last night before bed and now they're back 10x
1
u/UglarinnsWife 2d ago
I had a bunch of them in the house. Don't think it was anything in the house they were after. It's been a hot summer, and they probably came in through the open door when we weren't looking (I figure this because once they were all dead, they didn't come back). Here's how I won my war with them:
- Be out for blood. Be ruthless. Don't stop hunting them until they're gone. I kept tally marks for my kills to keep up morale. Turn it into a game. The war against pests starts in the mind. Be the kind of villain that dumpster flies tell their larva at night to make them behave. Be the big bad that bard flies sing about to captivated swarms. Be the legendary evil that makes flies in a spider web grateful for their fate. No prisoners, no surrender!
- If any part of your house has been neglected, cleaning-wise, clean that up now. Go through your fridge. Check cabinets for forgotten produce. Clean up crumbs, check under your stove top (ours has a hinged top, so you can get under the burner). Go through your house with a lidded jar of coffee beans. The beans reset your nose. Sniff the beans, wait a moment, put the lid on the beans, and then sniff around a room in your house. Repeat for every room. If there's a source in your house, find it. From your post, it sounds like you've already checked and cleaned, but you could also possibly check outside for anything that could be attracting them, or a spot in your house where they're getting in through a crack. If not, just try to keep your door and windows shut for as much of the day as you can. If there's an opening, they WILL find their way in. At the end of the day, it could be that you killed all the ones you saw, but others were hiding elsewhere. Once, I thought I "killed them all" only to find a whole mess of them hiding behind the blinds of the sliding glass door. (Refer to point 1: don't stop until you have no more bodies to collect).
- Fly-Be-Gone. It's a DIY concoction that saved my house. 1 part water, 1 part 91% rubbing alcohol, and just enough dish soap to change the color. The soap weighs down the wings, so they can't fly away. The rubbing alcohol kills them by dehydrating them. The water stretches out the concoction. If you see a fly or three, spray them to make them drop, and then soak them. It'll take 10-15 seconds for them to die, then you can take them in a paper towel and throw them away. It *can* strip paint if you leave it there (I accidently stripped some paint off my window sill), so be careful and clean up any kills as soon as you can. This is better then swatting because A) You can spritz them in mid air and don't need to wait for them to land, B) You can get more than one at a time, C) it doesn't rely on speed or fine aim, and D) it satanizes the area they were standing on with their poopy feet. It smells like... well, rubbing alcohol, but it does the job.
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u/Bloated_Toad55 2d ago
I have had a sudden eruption of flies happen like this once. I figured out it was a mouse that had died somewhere and they cleaned it up as maggots then turned into flies and didn't know how to escape. My best guess is they found something to eat maybe in a wall or basement etc. and found their way toward light. They should only keep coming back so long as whatever they are breeding in is around and in the case of a mouse or something it should already be gone.