Homemade Fly Traps

Fruit flies, gnats, whatever you want to call them when you have an infestation, these flying insects are a significant inconvenience. When you’re dealing with a gnat infestation, it often feels impossible to take back control of your home, but it has never been easier with homemade fly traps.

There are different types of gnats, including pesky fruit flies, drain flies, and even fungus gnats. They are all home invaders who love moist areas like drains and plant pots and feed on rotting organic matter, which is often found in these locations.

Fortunately, homemade fly traps effectively trap and destroy nuisance gnats, and many bait options are available. As a rule, anything sweet like sugar water, fruit juice, or honey attracts the insects. Take a look at what you have in the pantry and find a DIY fly trap below to fit your supplies.

Innovative Ideas for How to Trap Flies

If your home is under siege from swarms of gnats, you typically notice the annoying insects buzzing around the drains, particularly in the kitchen. Gnats are also often spotted around potted plants.

When an infestation strikes, don’t panic. Remove as much moisture of food or plant waste as possible to cut down favorable conditions, then browse this article on how to trap flies to study homemade fly traps and find the best DIY fly trap to remove the gnats from your home.

Once you understand how to trap flies using homemade fly traps, your kitchen, houseplants, and home are safe indefinitely from gnats and house flies. You can also learn how to make a carpenter bee trap and bait recipe or a trap for wasps just as easily.

Apple Cider Vinegar Homemade Trap

This homemade fly trap is inexpensive and straightforward to construct, and it quickly eliminates adult gnats and pesky flies. This vinegar trap is a practical approach to get rid of flies and may be moved around to locations where it’s most needed to combat the fly infestation, either inside or outside.

An apple cider vinegar and sugar combination is the best bait for a fruit fly trap. In a pinch, fruit juice or ripe fruit are some of the best bait for a fly trap.

To make this simple homemade gnat catcher, combine the vinegar, sugar, water, and dish soap in a Mason jar. Wrap plastic wrap around the opening and fasten it with a rubber band. Make numerous tiny holes in the plastic wrap with the toothpick.

The flies get close to the water’s sweet-sour surface. They perish if they try to land on the solution thanks to dish soap reducing the surface tension of the liquid and sticking to their wings and feet, rendering them unable to fly, so they drown in the liquid.

Home Remedies for Trapping Flies – Honey

When you need to know how to trap flies, honey is an excellent choice of bait for homemade fly traps and ensures your DIY fly trap lures plenty of adult flies to remove them from your home.

Colored paper, popsicle sticks, glue, and honey are all the supplies needed to make this fly trap. Cut strips of colorful paper and attach them to the sticks with glue.

Apply honey to each strip of paper and place traps in the soil of your house plants or anywhere else in your home where gnats are an issue. The gnats are drawn to the traps by the honey and bright colors and become glued to the honey, so they are easy to dispose of. When placed in strategic locations, you can also use this solution as a natural ant trap. Keep it away from pets and children.

Plastic Bottle DIY Fly Trap

Gnats and fungus gnats are drawn to the pleasant smell of red wine, just as they are to apple cider vinegar. For a homemade fruit fly trap and to catch gnats without vinegar, try a plastic bottle trap.

Fill a plastic bottle halfway with red wine, placing a paper cone down the bottle’s neck and leaving it in an area where fruit flies congregate. Fruit juice or sugar water are good alternatives.

Include a couple drops of your favorite liquid dish soap in the bait mixture, similar to the vinegar trap, so the fruit flies become covered in the dish soap and cannot fly out of the liquid and drown.

As the trap works, dead flies pile up in the liquid. Once the bottle is full, or every few days, to avoid foul odor, remove the paper cone, dump out the bait liquid and dead flies, and reset the trap.

Essential Oil Fly Spray

Essential oils are effective natural ways to get rid of gnats or house flies around your home. Unlike conventional repellent, this DIY fly spray uses simple non-toxic substances and is safe to use around your pets and family.

Fill a spray canister half full with the ingredients. Replace the top and shake. As you come across gnats, house flies, or other fly species, spray them directly.

DIY Fruit Fly Trap with Overripe Fruit

A banana trap is an inexpensive gnat control device to get rid of gnats without killing them. Place an overripe fruit like a banana in a small bowl and cover with plastic wrap.

Make numerous tiny holes in the plastic wrap with a toothpick to allow fruit flies to enter the bowl. The fruit flies won’t be able to get out of the bowl after they’ve entered to get to the banana. Take the DIY trap outside and remove the wrap to allow the fruit flies out after enough bugs are trapped in the container.

Essential Oils to Repel Fruit Flies

Essential oils have been known to repel various insects for decades and have many uses in the home, from repelling mosquitoes to bed bugs. Add an essential oil proven to repel gnats and fruit flies to your diffuser at the first sign of gnat infestation.

When you go outside, mix any insect repellent essential oil with a carrier oil, such as coconut or olive, and apply them to your skin to keep flies away from your face and body. This natural fly repellent for outside areas smells great to you but deters pesky bugs.

Citronella Candles Repel Flies

The citronella candle is one of the best fly repellent candles available. Like mosquitoes and other pests, fruit flies and gnats are repulsed by the candle odor.

Light a citronella candle and place it near doors to keep flies out of your house and away from you when you’re outside. Get rid of mosquitoes on the porch or deck while you are outdoors. The fragrance deters these little pests from entering your home through open windows or doors and has the bonus of being pleasant smelling.

Baking Soda Gnat Killing Solution

Baking soda is unbeatable for numerous cleaning and baking applications and can also be used as a DIY gnat spray. Baking soda is non-toxic, making it a safe substitute for many of today’s insect repellents.

Baking soda is readily available at almost any grocery store and is cost-effective since it’s cheap and leftovers have so many other uses.

Stir the baking soda and liquid dish soap into the water until thoroughly mixed. To efficiently kill the gnat infestation, pour the liquid solution into a spray bottle and spray the affected regions.

Yeast for Homemade Fly Traps

Gnats are attracted to yeast’s odor. To efficiently get rid of gnats in your home, mix some yeast with a tiny amount of sugar in a bowl, then add water to make a gnat-killing mixture for your DIY fly trap.

Cover the bowl with clear plastic and poke holes on the surface. The gnats will enter the perforations to access the yeast and won’t be able to exit, leaving them to drown.

Cinnamon Powder Kills Gnats

Cinnamon powder is one of the most efficient home remedies for killing fruit flies and gnats. This popular spice has pesticide capabilities and antibacterial, antifungal, and antimicrobial activities.

For an all-natural technique to get rid of fruit flies and gnats, sprinkle cinnamon powder on top of any soil infested with fungus gnats or around areas of high gnat activity. Cinnamon has the bonus of being easy to simply sweep up, it is non-toxic to animals and children, and makes your home smell amazing.

Insecticidal Soap Destroys Fungus Gnats

Insecticidal soap is another approach to eradicating fungus gnats. A commercial-grade product is available at most garden stores, or it’s simple to make your own to tackle fruit flies or fungus gnats or both types of bugs.

Combine the Castile soap and water in a spray bottle. Spray the liquid on the soil of your houseplants every day. Although this homemade fungus gnat spray does not contain chemical insecticides, it kills the bugs without harming the plants.

Castile soap, rather than dish soap, should be used in this recipe since the fatty acids in Castile soap dissolve the bugs, making it more effective and environmentally safe. Aphids, squash bugs, spider mites, and other pests are all killed by this DIY insecticidal soap spray.

White Vinegar and Baking Soda Drain Cleaner

Gnats often congregate in the sink area and are drawn to debris in the drain or garbage disposal. A simple white vinegar and baking soda mixture effectively cleans hard-to-reach places inside the drain and garbage disposal without using chemical cleaners.

To eliminate gnats coming from drain, sprinkle a generous measure of baking soda into the drain or the garbage disposal, followed by a cup of white vinegar. The baking soda interacts with the white vinegar, causing fizzing and bubbling.

Let the baking soda and vinegar sit in the drain for a few hours before flushing. The cleaning power of the solution removes organic matter and debris and destroys any gnats. Rinse well and flush the dead gnats down the drain with boiling water.

Natural Gnat Killer – Diatomaceous Earth

Diatomaceous earth is renowned for its insecticidal properties. It is safe to use directly on plants and poses no threat to pets or humans and is one of the easiest natural ways to get rid of fruit flies at home. Fungus gnats are eliminated by sprinkling diatomaceous earth on top of the soil of your potted plants. Diatomaceous earth is made up of diatom siliceous fossils.

When insect larvae crawl over the powder, the waxes on the insect’s body are removed and absorbed. Desiccation causes the insects to lose water and finally die from dehydration.

Rubbing Alcohol Fly Spray

In a spray bottle, combine rubbing alcohol and water. Squirt the liquid directly on the gnat-infested areas, such as around the sink or near your plant. The alcohol’s powerful odor repels them, and if it comes into contact with insects, it kills them instantly.

Don’t spray this solution directly on your house plants until you’ve tested it on a few leaves to ensure it won’t harm them. Alcohol is very drying and may damage more delicate plants.

DIY Flypaper for All Fly Species

Commercial flypaper is typically used to catch houseflies or as a natural moth trap, although it’s good at catching gnats, too. Hang flypaper strips in areas of your home where gnats are a problem. The gnats land on the strips and become stuck on the paper’s sticky surface. With a few essential components, you can create your own homemade flypaper.

To make your own indoor moth trap that also catches lots of other bugs, blend the maple syrup, white sugar, and brown sugar in a small mixing bowl and stir well to combine. Cut the paper into strips and use the paste to coat it. Hang the paper strips throughout the house, particularly near windows, doors, and plants. The gnats are drawn to the tasty substance and fly onto the paper, where they stick.

Whether it’s gnats, fungus gnats, fruit flies, or house flies, a fly infestation is inconvenient and annoying. While learning how to trap flies can seem challenging, in reality, many everyday items you probably already have are vital components in homemade fly traps.

Next time you have a gnat or fruit fly problem, rest assured you have the knowledge and tools to craft a DIY fly trap and quickly say goodbye to your pest problem.

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