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You keep everything clean in your house, you always check your window screen, and you always close your door when you enter your house. Yet still out of the corner of your eyes, you see it. A fly zigzagging in your house.
Although most people associate flies with summer, flies can produce season round. It’s only that they’re super active during the hot seasons. Flies can crawl on almost anything, whether it’s feces, spoiled food, or garbage. Also, ripped screens, unsealed cracks in windows, and poor sanitation can lead to fly infestation.
While usually just a nuisance, flies can carry several diseases harmful to both pets and humans like cholera, dysentery, tuberculosis, eye infection, typhoid fever, etc. They tend to pick up bacteria, viruses, and fungi and then spread these pathogens by contaminating food and water.
If you have a fly problem in your home, it’s prime time to learn how to get rid of flies. Below, we’ve provided you with several effective remedies on how to get rid of flies. Continue reading to learn more.
Flowers and Herbs
There are some flowers and herbs that you can plant both in your garden and balcony to repel flies away from your house. The flowers and herbs that can repel flies away include:
- Basil: Basil is a popular culinary herb found in Italian cuisines. It produces an aroma that can repel house flies and fruit flies. To get rid of flies’ plant basil in your garden or balcony. The best part is this plant doesn’t require much work to maintain and can survive in any climate.
- Lavender: Hang lavender bundles around your home or let it grow in your garden to get rid of flies. You can also burn lavender oil near entryways and windows to keep flies out of your house.
- Hot Pepper: Flies tend to avoid hot pepper because it inhibits their ability to breathe. You can grow peppers in your garden or have a plant on your balcony, and flies will stay away from your home.
- Cloves: Take 20 whole cloves and poke them in ripe citrus or apple fruit. Place the fruit on a plate and see how fast the flies disappear. Apart from keeping flies away, the aroma from the fruit will leave your house smelling amazing for weeks.
Eliminate Food Sources
Dirty dishes with food remains, whether in the sink or left on the table will invite flies same goes for unleaded trash cans, compost bins, and half-empty pet bowls. Go through every room in your house and do what you have to do to shut down the buffet. Do it bi-weekly or weekly- doing it once won’t keep the flies away for long.
Ginger Sprays
Making a ginger spray is quite easy, and it works like a charm. The strong odor emitted by ginger repels flies, keeping them away from your house. You can also use a mixture of ginger and water to repel other insects from your farm. The strong, repulsive smell of ginger will effectively keep flies at bay.
Vinegar and Dish Soap
You can create a mixture of vinegar and dish soap to trap files. Take a shallow dish bowl and fill it with an inch of apple cider vinegar. You can even add a tablespoon of sugar. After that, add a few drops of fruit-scented dish soap.
You can leave the dish uncovered or you can cover it tightly with a plastic wrap. Ensure, you’ve poked some few holes on top to attract the flies. The vinegar and sugar will attract the files to the dish. But once inside, the flies will sink because of the dish soap.
Venus Flytrap
I bet you’ve seen movies where giant plants eat people. Well, Venus is a tiny version of that plant, and it doesn’t consume humans. It attracts insects, traps, and then digests them to obtain nutrients. When you plant these plants outside your house, they will get rid of flies and other insects.
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The plant works by trapping the fly inside it, then it secretes a digestive fluid, which dissolves the fly’s soft inside. In about 5 to 12 days it spits the fly’s exoskeleton.
Make Fly Repellant Sprays Using Essential Oils
Most essential oils produce strong odors that repel flies. When you make a spray from a mixture of essential oils, you can keep way flies away from your home.
To make the spray, you must find essential oils with strong odors like thyme oil, peppermint oil, cinnamon oil, lemongrass oil, etc. Place 10 drops of each essential oil in a spray bottle. Add 2 cups of water and 2 cups of non-flavored vodka. Shake the ingredients vigorously to blend them.
Pyrethrin-based Insecticide
If you’re experiencing a large fly infestation, insecticides can come in handy since they work quickly. However, they’re not effective in the long run since flies have a short life cycle. They can easily develop resistance against the insecticide. Furthermore, the effect of the insecticide fades away fast.
Pyrethrin-based insecticides are great for indoor use, but first, ensure you have ventilated your house well and follow all the instructions to the later.
Light Traps
Flies are attracted to short-wavelength light. So you can use an indoor light trap combined with ultraviolet light and sticky traps to trap flies.
When you connect the light to the switch and turn it on, any flies that get to the light get zapped by electricity and dies or gets trapped depending on the light trap you’ve selected.
Ensure you mount the light traps away from windows and entrances, so they can’t be seen from the outside. You also need to mount it five feet off the floor.
Electronic Swatter
The electronic swatter is an excellent tool to kill flies in your house instantly. It looks like a badminton racket, but with three layers of electrified wire mesh. It also features an ON/OFF button that controls the capacitors inside the device the produces high voltage.
To kill flies, take the swatter and sweep it gently in the air. If flies fly through the mesh, it will get struck by high voltage, which will kill them instantly. Remember, you should not touch the electric swatter with your bare hand when it on- it will jolt you.
Sticky Traps
These are strips of sticky papers that you can hang or lay down throughout your house. They’re not super effective, but they serve the purpose and prevent infestation.
How to Get rid of Flies: Additional methods
- Figure out how they’re getting into your house
- Clean up after your pets
- Stop using rat poison to kill rats, since their carcasses will attract flies
- Don’t leave leaves and grass clippings to decay near your house
- Store your food properly in the right containers
Final Thoughts
Flies are both a nuisance and hazardous to your health, so make use of these few tips to keep them away from your food and water and prevent any infestation. All the best!
