OK to Bug Bomb?

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akthor

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We have had this fruit fly problem for months now.

We don't leave fruit or vegetables out or other food. I put bleach in the drains and garbage disposal. We don't have plants. We don't understand where they are coming from. I have tried traps to know avail.

We live in a threeplex? 3 - 2 bedroom apts side by side in one building. We all share the same basement it's just divided into 3 basements by drywall. We think our immediate neighbor is a hoarder. Judging by her rear porch and her generally slovenly look and we think that maybe the flies are coming from her side thru the basement? The wall down there that seperates us isn't airtight there are holes where the plumbing and electrical go thru.

I am thinking of getting that spray foam and sealing all the holes in the wall.

Then I would like to bug bomb the house and see if that gets rid of them.

Is it OK to bug bomb with beer and stuff going in fermenters?

Any help or ideas would be appreciated.
 
I have used these bombs before when a tenant downstairs brought fleas into the house. This stuff is not fun. Cleanup is miserable. I would not advise leaving anything you will be consuming out with this stuff. I have also had a fruit fly problem in the past. I know this doesn't apply because you think it is coming from next door but I'll share in case it helps. I got rid of fruit on the counter. Any beer/soda bottles/cans I had consumed were immediately rinsed out before they were recycled and or tossed out (these buggers love the stuff left over in bottles and cans). We also got a bowl with apple cider vinegar in it and put some clear wrap over it. I then poked holes big enough to let the fruit flies in. You would not believe how many I caught in a single night. I got the population pretty well under control in a short amount of time.

If you do use the bomb my advice is to move your bear equipment out.
 
Done all this to no avail :( Even left the heat off in the house for a couple days and it got sub 50's inside here hoping to kill them off. Soon as we turned the heat back up they reappeared.

I got rid of fruit on the counter. Any beer/soda bottles/cans I had consumed were immediately rinsed out before they were recycled and or tossed out (these buggers love the stuff left over in bottles and cans). We also got a bowl with apple cider vinegar in it and put some clear wrap over it. I then poked holes big enough to let the fruit flies in. You would not believe how many I caught in a single night. I got the population pretty well under control in a short amount of time.
 
Done all this to no avail :( Even left the heat off in the house for a couple days and it got sub 50's inside here hoping to kill them off. Soon as we turned the heat back up they reappeared.

Do you own the place, or rent?

If you rent, its your landlord's problem.
 
Do you own the place, or rent?

If you rent, its your landlord's problem.

As a renter of most of my teen years and all of my adult life, and having rented from alot of "different" folks, sometimes particularly with bugs, acting then dealing with it is the way to go. I once had to hire exterminators (yes pluaral) for an entire day to rid my apt of an infestation that my neighbor brought in. I paid them, then stapled the invoice to the rent check (minus the total of the invoice) and moved out at the end of that month.
 
You sure they are fruit flies? Drain flies look very similar. I'd bleach all of your drains and check the wax rings on your toilets.

If a toilet is gets loose, daily use can cause it to rock and destroy the wax ring that seal the toilet to the sewer drain. Once there is an opening the sewer flies can get into the drain and lay eggs....once this happens its hard to track down where they are coming from.
 
Before waging chemical warfare on you, and more importantly, your beer, try putting a piece of fruit into a sour cream container, or yogurt container...etc...etc... with some water and a touch of dishsoap. Then cover with cling wrap, and poke a few holes into that. I managed to eliminate a fair amount of fruit flies back in my college days. (Former roommates were pigs.)
 
Do you have any potted plants? We had a problem this summer with fruit flies that drove us to our wits end. We washed dishes as soon as we made them and had about 5 traps going at the same time. Bleached drains like you wouldn't believe.

Turns out the damn things were hiding in our plants, which we immediately put outside and never looked back.

I would try to eliminate it through less aggressive means first, although I know that it can literally drive you crazy in the meantime. If you do use a bug bomb, I would want to bottle up that beer and get it as safe as possible beforehand.
 
As a poison dart frog and fruit fly breeder, I would suggest leaving out little condiment dishes with a dishwash soap solution and in others putting about an inch of really cheap nast beer. If you keep tons of them around and replace the liquids often, it will really decimate your fruit fly population. The flies seem to be attracted to the different liquids and end up drowning themselves in it.

As tacky as it may seem, hanging fly strips in your place for a few days can really help too.

I think you can get through your fly explosion without having to resort to bug bombs. There are many other methods that are cheaper and wont risk harming your beer at all.

-Matt
 
I wouldn't bug bomb my brewery. Especially not while I was brewing, even fermenting.

If you do have to resort to that, take out all your brew equipment and clean the room before putting it back in.

The best thing to try is clean the room real good with Simple Green or even a solution of whatever you use to sanitize your brew gear with after you patch the holes. No new flies coming in. No food for existing flies. No flies.
 
I just bombed twice and sprayed. This has been the worst flea year in decades. Also, you may have heard that bedbugs are a real problem, so I'll be glad I don't have those.

I didn't think twice about it, but then again, everything fermenting I have is closed system from the boil kettle to the glass, so.... no problem there. Everything else that may be consumed I am washing the hell out of. I mean, I'll be surprised if I'm not sterile by the end of this. And, I got the cats out of here (was just babysitting) and guess who the only thing on the menu is now.... I had no choice. Will probably bomb a third time. I sure made sure that all my grains and stuff were out of the place beforehand. I'll be giving the rig a thorough washdown before I brew again. Crickey!!
 
+1 to the apple-cider vinegar thing. It works even better if you put a piece of banana or orange in the dish and just cover it with the vinegar.

My old roomies were slobs and I had a carpet of flies covering almost the entire surface of the dish after 3 days. Totally eliminated the problem though! If it's not catching as many as you like, put out a few smaller dishes throughout the house. Your place will smell like vinegar for a few days, but that's a small price to pay.

- Budista
 
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