Fruit Flies

I have a bit of a fruit fly problem in my apartment. At first I thought it was some apples I had sitting on the counter so, to be safe, I threw them away. But I still had them flying around. Then, when I went to put some onions in my onion drawer, a whole bunch of fruit flies came swarming out to surround my head like Pig Pen in the Peanuts comic strip. I pulled the drawer out, took it outside and left it on the steps. I noticed that it had a rotten onion in the bottom under the good onions. That is where they were breeding. I  cleaned out the drawer throughly and it is now empty of fruit flies and only contains onions and garlic.

But what to do about the swarms of fruit flies flying around my kitchen?? I went on-line and found a website that had all kinds of interesting suggestions. Most of the first half dozen or so involved putting a piece of ripe fruit in the bottom of a container, putting some kind of funnel or plastic wrap with holes over the top and trapping the fruit flies. Then they can be taken outside and released. It didn’t say whether or not I was supposed to sing “Born Free” during this operation but I got the impression that was part of the procedure.

Since I am not interested in setting the little buggers free, I kept looking for a practical way of offing them. A suggestion at the bottom of the page said to put water, dish detergent and balsamic vinegar in a bowl, cover it with plastic wrap, poke a few holes in it and set it on the counter. The fruit flies would be attracted to the balsamic vinegar, fly through the holes, land in the water with the vinegar and detergent and the detergent would kill them. The plastic wrap would guarantee they would stay in the bowl until they died. Now that is my kind of plan!

So that is what I did. This morning there were a half dozen little fruit fly bodies floating in the solution in each bowl, the one in the kitchen and the one in the bathroom (since the bathroom is next to the kitchen, they seemed to be having a satellite party in there). I’m going to keep the bowls out for 24 more hours and see if I can get most of them.

Yeah, I know, I am killing them. I did feel bad when the cop killed the bat the first time one ended up in my apartment a year ago. I felt bad but part of me was relieved that it was gone since they really creep me out. So if I don’t feel 100% bad about a bat dying, I really don’t feel that bad about killing a bunch of small, annoying, flitting-around-my-face fruit flies. If they had the capacity to think, they would realize that they are trespassing in my apartment and they need to find their own apartment to occupy. There are other apartments available in this building that they can move into. But they don’t have the capacity to think. They only have the capacity to fly around, procreate and fly around some more. And, since that flying around is really annoying to us creatures who walk and think and pay the rent, they must go bye-bye to fruit fly heaven where they can fly around, procreate and fly around to their hearts (if they had one) content.

Hopefully this infestation will be resolved in the next day or so. Then the only occupants of this apartment will be me, Kismet and Cupid (the cats) and the occasional daddy long legs. Just as it should be.