Fruit Flies
What are Fruit flies?
If you find your kitchen brimming with flies that appeared to turn up out of nowhere, you probably are dealing with fruit flies here. These are tiny annoying creatures that haul to your kitchen from the farmer’s market.
Fruit flies are attracted to rotting fruits and vegetables, alcohol, sugary drinks, and everything that is filthy and contaminated. These unwanted flies can cause health and sanitation related issues. Hence it is extremely important to know them closely. Let’s dive into the world of Fruit flies!
How does a Fruit fly look like?
The adult fruit flies are small creatures that are just 3-4 mm in length. They are oval in shape, and usually, the overall body color is tan. They have a tan thorax, black abdomen, and gray underside. Most of the adult fruit flies possess red eyes; however few of them also have darker eyes.
Fruit fly Behaviour
The male fruit flies tend to locate and do everything to woo the female flies for mating. The females are generally shy as they first want to confirm that the males belong to the same species. Usually, the males do all the work and females remain lazy and idle.
The fruit flies conduct a whole dancing ritual before they start mating. The opening dance starts when the male fly proceeds towards the female by vibrating his legs over her head. Both flies then spread their respective legs and face each other. This is done to increase the confidence of the male fruit fly. In the final stage, he bends downward while spreading the wings in order to express his willingness to mate officially. Apparently, the males are considered to be egoistic, and they never forget rejection. If a male is rejected multiple times by the females he wanted to mate with, he makes fewer efforts to approach another female.
Eating Habits of Fruit flies
Fruit flies usually eat organic food items that are rotten or decayed. They are attracted to damaged fruits and veggies, beer, wine, or anything that contains alcohol or sugar. The adult fruit flies also like to eat spoilt fruit pulp and residue, fungi and the dirt that remain in the toilet and drain pipes. The larvae of fruit flies also possess similar eating habits as the adults and like to eat damaged vegetable matter.
Reproduction and Life cycle
Fruit flies have a short life cycle that lasts around 40-50 days. However, the lifespan also depends a lot on the temperature these flies live in. There are four stages of Fruit flies life cycle – Egg, Larvae, Pupa, and Adults.
During the first stage, the female adult fruit fly usually lays twenty or fewer eggs on mature fruits or vegetables. After two – four days, the eggs conceive into larvae. It’s quite difficult to identify these flies during this stage.
In the second stage, the hatching larvae or maggots nourish inside the mature fruits or vegetables along with the bacteria transported by the female fly while laying the eggs. This makes the fruit damage from inside. During this stage, you can see the presence of fruit flies by cutting the fruit open. Due to the damage, the fruit directly falls on the ground, and the mature larvae dug themselves into the soil in order to pupate.
Depending on the climatic conditions, it takes them about one day or a week or even months to turn into a fully grown adult.
Are Fruit flies Dangerous?
These disgusting and unwanted flies are surely annoying and create a lot of nuisance, but the big question remains, are they dangerous to humans and do they bite?
Unlike other flies, fruit flies do not tend to bite; hence, they aren’t directly dangerous. They directly do not cause any illness as well; however, they do all other nasty things that can be harmful to you. These flies sit on all sort of filthy and contaminated places, and this is how they transport bacteria and other infectious microorganisms to our food which might give rise to a number of diseases. They can even contaminate your valuable products, and their larvae can cause excessive stomach ache when these obnoxious flies are unintentionally absorbed or eaten by humans, especially children and patients.
So, basically, you don’t have to worry about them biting you because they don’t have any teeth. If you still experience a fruit fly bite, then you must have totally confused them for some other species of flies. However, since fruit flies multiply quickly, they can pose a serious threat to the health and sanitation of your house. Therefore, measures should be taken if you notice a fruit fly infestation around you.
Signs of Fruit flies Infestation
If you find these flies landing on your toilet drain and then resting on a towel, or in the kitchen sitting on your food items every now and then, it is time that you should start looking for visible signs of fruit flies infestation in or around your home.
The best way to detect the signs of fruit flies infestation is to look for adult flies and the pupae. You can easily spot the adults buzzing around your kitchen or garbage bins where you dump your rotten fruits, veggies, or beer cans. The mature larvae will come out in a dry area in order to pupate, and that’s where you can spot them. They are often confused with the feces of rodent or cockroach so to avoid the confusion; you should look for a pair of horns attached on the pupae end.
How to get rid of Fruit flies?
Destroy them at the source
Once you’ve identified a fruit flies infestation, the first step should be to obliterating their home at the source. Clean the clogged kitchen sinks, dispose of all the decaying fruits and vegetables, freeze your compost, clean the garbage bins using bleach, and use it only after it gets completely dry.
Trap them using a plastic wrap
If you still find fruit flies roaming around, it’s time to trap them using their favorite source of food – rotten or damaged fruits and vegetables. All you have to do is collect all the remaining decayed food and put it in a disposable trash and cover it tightly using a plastic wrap. Make tiny holes so that the flies can enter and place the can near an infested area. Now, wait for some time. As soon as you see fruit flies buzzing around the can and entering it, trap and dispose of them away from your home. Keep repeating the same process unless the flies entirely disappear from your home.
Red wine trap
The plastic wrap formula might fail if the flies quickly manage to fly when you reach out to them. This is why we’ve got an improved trick for you. Since fruit flies are attracted to alcohol, take some red wine and mix it with detergent powder and pour the solution into a disposable container. Cover the container using a plastic wrap and make holes in it. The solution will make the flies drown, and they won’t be able to fly away no matter how hard they try. Repeat the same process unless the flies entirely disappear from your home.
Try Vinegar
Fill the disposable container full of water and mix a few drops of vinegar, sugar, and dish soap in it. Keep the container near an infested area. The flies will get attracted to the smell of vinegar and drown instantly after coming in contact with the solution. Continue the process until you finally get rid of these unwanted files.
Sticky fly traps
If the above mentioned homemade solutions aren’t doing the job, buy sticky fly traps from a nearby store. Once a sticky trap gets full, just throw it and replace with a new trap.
Purchase a carnivorous plant
The sticky leaves of a carnivorous sundew plant trap and eat the fruit flies as soon as they come in its contact. This can serve as an ongoing solution to the problem of fruit flies in your home.
Take help from the professionals
If the infestation goes out of hand and cannot be controlled using all the tricks mentioned above, you might need to seek professional help. This might look like an expensive measure, but at least you can be sure that fruit flies won’t attack your home for a long time.
Pictures
Collection of pictures of fruit flies:
Interesting Facts
- The scientific name of Fruit fly is Drosophila melanogaster.
- An adult female fruit fly can lay up to 500-1000 eggs in her entire lifespan.
- Humans and fruit flies are similar in terms of genetics so much so that they play an important role in the study of Alzheimer’s disease, aging, cancer, immunity, alcohol, and even drug abuse.
- With 100,000 active neurons, the fruit flies have a high-powered brain and sharp memory.
- Research has proved that fruit flies aren’t just attracted to alcohol but also feels good to consume it and get intoxicated. In fact, adult males who have faced rejection from a female tend to drink four times more alcohol.
So, there you have it, everything about fruit flies! So, next time when you spot an infestation created by these annoying flies, use one or two of our proposed measures to get rid of them completely.
