It fruit fly time how to eradicate?

[Robin Rastle]

Its the season for those tiny fruit flies that want to dance in front of your eyes - very annoying. I have been told that these can also spread microbes to spoil your brewing. They get everywhere.

Canned Fly spray doesnt work on them

Tried a jar with little syrup with a paper lid and some pin holes and this does catch them but how many jars to scatter round my place?

Anyone have some remedies?

 

[Lampy]

I have used the jar trick, but with a bit of vinegar, water, and dish soap. The vinegar smells like fermented/rotted fruits and attracts the flies. I suppose you could also put beer with soap in the jar. I cover them with plastic wrap and poke little holes for the flies to find their way in.

 

[doublejef]

Bananas are by far their favorite fruit.

 

[Broken Crow]

 

[Bobby_M]

Cups or jars with either wine or apple cider vinegar and a drop of dish soap (no more than one drop).

Instead of a flat paper with holes, make paper cones that sit in the jar like a funnel. Tape it all the way around. Ideally, the pointy end of the cone should be about 1/2" above the liquid. They fly in and then can't figure out how to find the escape hole because the clear glass looks like the better option. They get tired and hit the water and that's that.

I typically have an issue once a year and this has always fixed it in a matter of a couple days.

 

[Maylar]

These work too...

fruit fly traps

 

[FloppyKnockers]

These have always been my go-to. A piece of fruit, a couple ounces of beer, keg dredges, etc. will collect all of them.

Cut the top off a plastic bottle, invert the top, tape around if there are gaps.

 

[jdubdvdt]

You need to use a bait and trap system like others have suggested.

If you have eliminated their food source (fruit, bananas usually) they're hanging out in your drains and breeding. You will need another method most likely. I would recommend Gentrol IGR (insect growth regulator) or even better Nibor Insecticide Foam + IGR.

 

[Deadalus]

They hung around forever last year, even with vinegar/water/soap traps. Seemed like a deep clean of the kitchen finally offed them. We did a complete wipe down of all the cabinets, walls, and appliances using mostly Fantastic. They are so small and quick breeding.

 

[Dragonid]

For perspective, when I used to grow millions of them for lab work, we fed them on substrate made primarily of cornmeal, molasses, and yeast ... lots of yeast. Their common name will mislead some people, but they are really feeding on the fungi that rapidly colonizes and decomposes carbohydrate rich foods.

 

[DaveDiamond]

I don't think those little tiny ones that dance in front of your eyes are actual fruit flies, but fly strips do a great job of catching them.

 

[MaxStout]

Probably gnats. They zoom around like that.

 

[Cheshire Cat]

I’ve got some around my Corny kegs but a clever spider built its web and is happily eating them.

 

[Broken Crow]

I’ve got some around my Corny kegs but a clever spider built its web and is happily eating them.

 

[Cheshire Cat]

I’ve had spiders in my car wing mirrors for years but now they’re in the car. But I like spiders and thank goodness they are small and not poisonous in the UK.

 

[Broken Crow]

I’ve had spiders in my car wing mirrors for years but now they’re in the car. But I like spiders and thank goodness they are small and not poisonous in the UK.

Envious,... I used to like spiders till I was bitten by a mature Brown Recluse and lost 3 days of work in a fever. The scar disappeared a few years later when I lost 2/3 of the skin from my right arm in a gas explosion, but a while later my GF was bitten by one and still has the scar where the flesh rotted away. I'm in Canada and get Brown Recluse and Black Widows so I kinda have to kill them. I do let the small millipedes in my basement live though as they eat bugs and larvae. As to the wing mirror, I have that every time I go to my van between May and November..... the ones that get inside usually die from the heat between rides.
Is this a good place for a PSA for new keggers to tell them that they should always wash the underside of cornies as spiders love to nest there if it's been left sitting on a basement floor for more than a day?