There’s two methods. All credit goes to her so if she eventually sees this, your temporary fruit fly expertise lives on! lol
She mentioned that at the time most fly labs literally just used method 1. We personally always just used method 2 because it’s not that hard and it was extremely effective (she calls it the “nuke them from orbit” method in the old instructions email).
Method 1. You get a shallow dish/cup, or a bowl with steep walls, and put alcohol in it. Sweet liqueur works well or you can put a bit of sugar in the alcohol to make it sweeter. The fly is tempted by the thing that smells like food and they drown.
Method 2. You need narrow bottle or container that will stand up, tape, a sheet of paper, a pen or pencil, and a lure to put in the bottom to attract them. I remember the alcohol working, as above, or you can use fruit; they obviously love bananas. If you have yeast, sprinkle some on top of the fruit, because fruit flies love yeast too.
Fold the paper in half and roll it into a cone so it’s totally closed on one end. Tape it into that shape, and then use your pen/pencil tip to open the end a bit, just big enough to fit a fruit fly.
Put the lure in the bottom, and point the cone narrow-side down into the bottle. Seal the cone on well, and put it where the flies like to congregate. They’ll be attracted to the lure, but it’s nearly impossible for them to escape the little hole in the cone that protrudes into the bottle.
After a few days, fold the paper up to block the hole, or tape it or whatever, and put it in the freezer overnight. Then you can just throw the bastards away all at once!
My wife, then girlfriend, used to just cut a 2L soda bottle in half, then put the top half upside down in the bottom half, otherwise following the same process outlined in your method 2 instructions. It was, indeed, quite effective.
I have a worm farm and when the fruit flies invade, I just take a small bowl, drop of Dawn and like a 1/4 cup apple cider vinegar. After a week or so they’re mostly gone (but can hold on for a while because of eggs hatching).
There’s two methods. All credit goes to her so if she eventually sees this, your temporary fruit fly expertise lives on! lol
She mentioned that at the time most fly labs literally just used method 1. We personally always just used method 2 because it’s not that hard and it was extremely effective (she calls it the “nuke them from orbit” method in the old instructions email).
Method 1. You get a shallow dish/cup, or a bowl with steep walls, and put alcohol in it. Sweet liqueur works well or you can put a bit of sugar in the alcohol to make it sweeter. The fly is tempted by the thing that smells like food and they drown.
Method 2. You need narrow bottle or container that will stand up, tape, a sheet of paper, a pen or pencil, and a lure to put in the bottom to attract them. I remember the alcohol working, as above, or you can use fruit; they obviously love bananas. If you have yeast, sprinkle some on top of the fruit, because fruit flies love yeast too.
Fold the paper in half and roll it into a cone so it’s totally closed on one end. Tape it into that shape, and then use your pen/pencil tip to open the end a bit, just big enough to fit a fruit fly.
Put the lure in the bottom, and point the cone narrow-side down into the bottle. Seal the cone on well, and put it where the flies like to congregate. They’ll be attracted to the lure, but it’s nearly impossible for them to escape the little hole in the cone that protrudes into the bottle.
After a few days, fold the paper up to block the hole, or tape it or whatever, and put it in the freezer overnight. Then you can just throw the bastards away all at once!
My wife, then girlfriend, used to just cut a 2L soda bottle in half, then put the top half upside down in the bottom half, otherwise following the same process outlined in your method 2 instructions. It was, indeed, quite effective.
I knew the dish method but not the cone solution. Gonna go do this right now! Thanks!
Cone solution works for wasps too
I have a worm farm and when the fruit flies invade, I just take a small bowl, drop of Dawn and like a 1/4 cup apple cider vinegar. After a week or so they’re mostly gone (but can hold on for a while because of eggs hatching).