Fruit fly, or Drosophila: methods of combating it

Appearance of a fruit fly

What does a fruit fly look like?
The insects are yellow-brown in color with black rings across the abdomen. In nature, flies feed on rotting plant debris and plant sap, and their larvae also feed on microorganisms. Males are smaller in size than females, whose body length does not exceed 2.5 mm. Also, males have a darker back part.

Reproduction of the Drosophila fly and where pests come from

Small insects feed on tree sap and vegetables, but they give preference to fruits. Fruit flies live in large numbers in vineyards and orchards. These places are safe for flies, since they do not harm the crop, which means there is no point in fighting them. In some regions, they can be found in the following places: fruit warehouse, wine cellar, canned fruit and juice factories. In open areas only at air temperatures above 16ºС.

Drosophila reproduction process

The duration of fruit fly ontogenesis is about 10 days at an ambient temperature of 25ºС, and at 18ºС it almost doubles. At favorable temperatures in the winter season, its life cycle can be up to 2.5 months.

During her short life, the female lays up to 400 eggs on organic materials. The larvae appear a day later. Their growth period is five days. During this time, the larvae molt twice. During this time, they feed on rotten fruits and then turn into pupae. The duration of this stage is five days. After this, young flies emerge from them.

Where do they come from?

“What kind of fruit flies are they and where do they come from?” is a common question on thematic forums. Many people have the impression that these midges literally materialize out of thin air. Some people confuse them with soil ones, but they belong to a different species and live on window sills in wet flower substrate.

The main source of fruit fly infestation is vegetables, fruits, and berries brought home.

The Drosophila egg is only 0.5 mm long. The female lays from 50 to 80 eggs at a time. With one apple or plum you can quietly bring a flock of midges.

They will hatch in 8-15 days. They live no more than 20 days, but during this time the female will have time to lay up to 400 eggs.

Other options for where midges come from on fruit in an apartment:

• ventilation shafts;
• open windows, doors;
• Pets.

Theoretically, eggs can even be carried on shoes.

Another source of fruit flies is rotting houseplants. Decaying pulp attracts fruit flies as a favorable nutrient medium.

This happens especially often with cacti. Externally, the plant often looks normal, but putrefactive processes are already underway inside.

How to get rid of fruit flies using chemical means

Insecticide in aerosol - a remedy for fruit flies
You can quickly destroy small flies in the house with the help of insecticides.

Five ways to remove fruit flies indoors:

1. The use of aerosols such as Raid, Raptor, Dichlorvos, Combat and others shows good results in the fight against fruit flies indoors. When processing, there should be no pets or people in the room, and food should also be removed. After the procedure, you must wash your hands thoroughly with soap, and after the time specified in the instructions, open the window to ventilate the room.
2. The soil of indoor plants is a suitable environment where fruit flies can reproduce. To detect the larvae, you need to dig up the soil mixture with a toothpick or a small spatula without disturbing the integrity of the root system. If there are worms in it, you can use the insecticides Fitoverm, Actellik to destroy them, or simply transplant the plants into a new substrate.
3. To deal with fruit flies living in the kitchen sink, you can pour boiling water over it or add Mole, Mister Muscle or Domestos.
4. An effective remedy for flies is a fumigator with a plate treated with toxic substances. The device is very simple to operate; just plug it into the electrical network and wait for the flies to die.
5. To remove fruit flies, you can hang sticky tape in the kitchen. Place the trap in a place where flies accumulate.

Application of chemistry

By what means can these insects be removed? Among the chemical preparations against Drosophila fruit flies, the good old “Dichlorvos” and its modern odorless analogues work well. Remove all food and simply treat the room with an aerosol (try not to breathe in the poison yourself). After this, the kitchen should remain closed for 15-20 minutes. Then the room needs to be well ventilated: open the window and turn on the hood, if available.

Among the folk remedies, elderberry, tansy and fern leaves help get rid of midges well. In the apartment where these plants are dried, fruit flies try not to linger. By the way, be careful with tansy - its phytoncides provoke ailments in people suffering from vascular diseases of the brain.

Napkins soaked in various homemade compositions will be effective. Place them in saucers on the windowsills and you can quickly get rid of fruit flies. Here are a couple of proven recipes for use in the apartment:

1. 100-150 ml milk, 2 tsp. sugar and ground black pepper;
2. 75 ml of milk, 5 g of formalin and 5 spoons of sweetened soda.

A solution of potassium permanganate will help get rid of flies that have settled in flowers. The soil is also treated with special insecticides that are harmless to living plants. These measures are aimed not only at expelling adult flies from the house, but also at destroying the masonry they leave behind.

Fighting flies at home with folk remedies

Tomato tops - a means to repel small flies
Drosophila are attracted to rotting leaves and damp substrate, so they often hover near pots with indoor plants. Insects can also be caused by contaminated soil. To prevent them from multiplying, it is necessary to calcine the soil in the oven. It is recommended to promptly remove rotten and fallen leaves and not to pour water into the ground.

Four ways to deal with fruit flies:

1. Small insects cannot stand the pungent smell of tomato tops. To get rid of fruit flies, you can grow seedlings on window sills.
2. Camphor is an effective remedy for small flies, since they cannot tolerate the smell of this product. To kill annoying flies, you need to pour camphor into a frying pan and heat it on the stove to maximum temperature until steam forms. Next, walk with it throughout the house so that the aroma spreads throughout all the rooms.
3. Essential oils of basil, anise, and eucalyptus can repel fruit flies. To scent a room of 15 m², the product consumption will be 5 drops.
4. At the dacha near the house, you can plant myrtle, eucalyptus, tansy or geranium to repel pests.

Drosophila: where do they come from?

Drosophila are widespread throughout the world. Various species of these insects are found in deserts, steppes, highlands, tropical forests and, of course, cities. Those species that annoy humans are considered synanthropic. Because of their wide range, which literally includes the entire planet, fruit flies are virtually always around you. If the insects appeared suddenly, then something caused them to concentrate exactly where you found them. Such reasons may be:

• Easy access to food - fruits, vegetables, herbs.
• Improper food storage - food is easy to get to.
• Suitable ambient temperature - cold outside, warm in the apartment.
• Open drinks available - beer, wine, juices.
• Garbage bin – this is where you can find decomposing food scraps.

It takes 1-2 hours for unattended food to be discovered and a swarm of fruit flies to gather around it, so the process of their appearance can proceed at lightning speed.
Drosophila can get into the house:

• Through windows and vents
• Window and door gaps
• Sink and bath drains
• By ventilation
• With purchased products
• On flowers and harvest brought from the dacha

Knowing the reasons for the appearance of fruit flies and the ways in which they entered the house already provides some keys to effective pest control. With this information, you can deprive insects of food and block their path to it. If insects:

• They are coming out of the drains - start cleaning the drains.
• Appeared along with purchased products - carefully select and inspect each vegetable or fruit when purchasing, change the store if the situation repeats regularly.
• We came with you from the dacha - keep only the fruits in good condition, throw away damaged products before you bring them home.
• If they penetrated from the outside, install small mesh on windows, vents and ventilation ducts.

If fruit flies entered the house through cracks, cosmetic or major repairs will help, depending on the condition of the room. The only difficulty here may be that the gaps that exist for such small insects are not always visible to the human eye. If you don’t know how flies get into your house, although you have already taken all possible preventive measures to protect yourself from them, do not despair. You can quickly and effectively get rid of fruit flies without even knowing where they came from.

Fly in the house: how to get rid of it using traps

Trap with bait for fruit flies
Destruction of fruit flies is a rather labor-intensive process. In order not to take up the newspaper and kill flies manually, you can make traps from improvised materials or buy ready-made ones.

Types of traps for small insects:

1. Place a few pieces of banana or apple in a glass jar and pour in sweet syrup or juice. Make a funnel from a sheet of paper so that there is a small hole at the bottom. Place the funnel in the container with the tip down and seal the diameter with tape on the neck at the joint. Fruit flies will fly to the smell of the bait, get trapped and will no longer be able to get out.
2. Pour apple cider vinegar into a deep plate, add a little water and a couple of drops of dishwashing detergent. Cover the container with cling film and make several holes in it with a thick needle or toothpick. The flies will fly into the trap, they will be attracted by the smell of the bait, and will no longer be able to get out of it.
3. You can remove small flies from your home using a glue trap with Raptor liquid bait. Insects are attracted to the substance with which its inner side is treated. Once they land on a sticky surface, they can't get back out. Drosophila remain inside the trap, thereby maintaining its aesthetic appearance.

Drosophila traps

By mixing honey with saccharin in a ratio of 10:1, you can obtain a viscous mixture for impregnating trap napkins. After drying, you need to sprinkle them with a little water and place them on the windowsills to catch annoying midges.

Apple cider vinegar is also on the fruit fly menu. Dilute it with water and add dishwashing detergent; fill one third of the mayonnaise jars with the resulting mixture. Drosophila midges will fly inside, but after such a “treat” they will not get back out.

You don’t have to bother making traps by hand, but just buy regular sticky fly tape. It will need to be secured in several places in the kitchen (near the table, above the trash can) and on all the windows in the apartment where the flowers are.

If you have fruit flies in your home, don’t despair. The neighborhood is unpleasant, but there is no great harm from it. And it’s very easy to get rid of small annoying flies forever.