Anyone else having an issue with flies this summer?

[BigVMan23]

Flies around my area have been the worst I have ever seen, and I have had 2 invasions in my house. I am pretty sure the first round came when a step daughter moved out and doors were left open for quite a while as they moved stuff, including the garage door. That was a few weeks ago. Now working on my 2nd invasion and where all these came from I don't know. I have never hung up fly strips before, but have done it now twice. Was mowing grass a while back after a brief shower and was almost engulfed in a swarm of flies next to the house. You can walk out the front door and there seem to be 5-10 always buzzing around and at least 2-3 always seem to get in. It's just crazy. Anyone else dealing with this?

[rjs4470]

Doesn't seem to be any worse than usual. The thing I've noticed is the gnats are really bad this year. I haven't seen this many gnats since moving here almost 20 years ago.

[spindoc]

Doesn't seem to be any worse than usual. The thing I've noticed is the gnats are really bad this year. I haven't seen this many gnats since moving here almost 20 years ago.

Yep. Gnats are thick.

[BigVMan23]

Yep. Gnats are thick.

 

Got that too...but these flies are about to drive me nuts.

[B-Ball-fan]

Typically in late spring and early summer I start having trouble with fruit flies hitch hiking on bananas from the grocery store then breeding like crazy.

 

I like my bananas to ripen naturally, but once this problem begins I have to settle for storing them in the refrigerator until the warm month are over. I'll take one out at a time daily so that it will be ripe and ready for me for breakfast

 

Once the infestations gets out of control, I'll leave a clear plastic wide mouthed bottle on my counter with a banana peel or a strawberry inside, and every fruit fly in the house will think that it's party time inside of the bottle.

 

When I wake in the morning I'll creep quietly into the kitchen and carefully place the lid on the bottle so as to not to disturb them, assuring that the entire party of flies are trapped, and then I'll discard the bottle.

 

With this method it really only takes a day or two to rid my place of every fly in the house no matter how many. You give them what they want and they won't think twice about it, though they're not aware that they are headed for certain suffocation with no escape.

 

Though it seems hard to believe, when I inspect the bottle there are literally a hundred or more flies inside which tells me that the problem was way worse than I had even realized, and would've gotten even worse if I hadn't tried to do something about it.

 

Swatting at them just isn't enough and store bought fruit fly traps are worthless. The method that I use works brilliantly and quickly, and when you wake to a bottle filled with an entire colony you get the satisfaction that the genocide is in full effect.

[TheDeuce]

^Simliar to what Bballfan does, you can set these traps and cover your container with plastic wrap, poke holes in it, and they can't get out.

 

I've done that a couple times with a water/sugar/vinegar mix and it slays the fruit flies every time.

[Jumper_Dad]

[BigVMan23]

 

Unfortunately I might have to get two...one for outside, and one for in my house.

[nees1212]

The hoverflies have been really bad. They're just annoying.

[Jim Schue]

As someone who loves sitting in the back porch, mosquitoes, flies and sweatbees are the bane of my existence.

[sweet16]

They have been terrible this year

[lawildcat]

Horse flies are really bad at the Compound this summer.

[BigVMan23]

Horse flies are really bad at the Compound this summer.

 

Had several of those too. One bit the fire out of me the other day while mowing grass.

[swamprat]

Believe it or not, in the 35 years I've lived in Florida, I've never had problems with flies. I had an issue with knats, last year, but never flies.

 

Must be all the snakes.

[Jim Schue]

Picked up a 3-pack of low-grade flyswatters from DG yesterday. Took a break from the office to sit on the back porch. Slayed 5 in 35 minutes. They just keep coming.