Not only are flies annoying, but they are disgusting too. They can spread diseases just by landing on your food, without your even noticing. They can ruin the time you spend outside trying to relax, and they can sneak inside every time you open the door. And while raising animals and having a compost pile may increase their numbers, even if you have no animals and a near sterile yard, they can fly on over from your neighbor’s. What can you do about it? Trap them with a few things you probably already have laying around the house, and here’s how.
How to make a fly trap:
- First gather up some materials, a symmetrical smooth plastic bottle (it can’t be a milk bottle or any type of bottle with a handle or ridges), some string or wire, some sugar, and some yeast or bread crumbs.
- Next, cut the bottle in two about 1/3 of the way down. Remove the lid.
- Turn the upper portion of the bottle upside down and slide it into the lower portion until the two cut ends meet.
- This should leave the bottle top a few inches from the bottle of the bottle.
- Now, make a couple of holes through both pieces on opposite sides of the bottle just below the cut line that is now the top. Thread the string or wire through the holes in whatever manner you like so as to allow you to use the string to hang the bottle by later.
- Finally, put a few spoons full of sugar and yeast or bread crumbs into the bottle, then carefully add water so that it comes about ½ inches or so from touching the upside down bottle top. The trap will not work if the water line is too far below, or if it touches the bottle top.
The trap functions by attracting the flies in, they have to land on the narrow opening and crawl in, but they will tend want to fly away instead of crawl around searching for an exit. This will have them either up in the corners where they can’t get out, or drowning in the yeasty water that attracted them.
Once your bottle trap is ready, hang it up in a tree or on a fence near your place. Since it’s pretty easy and inexpensive to make, you might want to put one at each corner of your yard and one near your garbage can. If you don’t see flies in your trap, adjust the water line or change your bait. When the trap is full of dead flies you can wash it out if you like, but since it’s made out of trash anyway you can just throw it away and save yourself from a nasty task. Happy fly hunting!
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9 thoughts on “How to Make a Fly Trap”
Instead of a picture of a fly, a picture of the trap would be helpful for those of us who are visual learners
Line 4 should read bottom of the bottle. I didn’t get it at first.
Use something like a plastic 2 liter soda bottle. Cut the top part of the plastic bottle like instructed then flip it over. The bottom part will look like a plastic pot or drinking glass and the top will be like a funnel. Place the narrow end of the “funnel” shaped top into the bottom. Poke some matching holes on each side of the bottom and the “funnel” to use to tie the top and bottom together and hold the funnel from slipping all the way in and to use for hanging.
yes–show finished trap–need to see cuts etc
thanks
To get rid of fruitflies: put apple cider vinegar in a jar and puncture the lid with small holes. You’ll soon have a jar of pickled fruitflies but your house will be free of them.
The fruitfly solution works very well.
I’m going to try this. ? What would work for big water bugs. I live very close to lake. And water bugs are bad and roaches
Roaches, also called “water bugs” and “palmetto bugs” (I’m from Texas and they are ALL roaches to me!) only one thing works for roaches /sigh Napalm
Or, if incendiaries are not convenient, or if you’re concerned the neighbors might complain, I’ve found my chickens absolutely adore the crunchy little bustards. I use a similiar trap as described above only with dry dog or cat food (anything with high aroma, like salmon or tuna flavor) in the bottom, once several are inside, just call the hens and dump. Even if you only have a couple of chickens, they can significantly reduce the bug/pest population in a yard.
With my girls, there are NEVER any escapees or survivors! I no longer have these bugs lingering around the exterior of my house either as my chickens follow me as I go around and disturb all the “dark” places bugs like to hide. I flush them out and the girls make sure they don’t make it to safety.
I opened “Learn to be a Master Carpenter at Home…” and this is what my security program instantly displayed !!!!
Potentially unwanted content found
This web page is on a list of websites with uncertain reputation or potentially unwanted content and has been blocked.
Go back to the previous page?
Please attend and correct the problem or at least ensure that you do not spread “crap” onto our computers.
I will be deleting this site due to this new issue. I also dislike the sales hour long redundant videos.