How to Keep Flies Out of Your Yard (and Out of Your House)

It’s summer now, which means one thing: damn flies are in my yard and ruining my kebabs. How can I get rid of them this year, once and for all? How can I — and you — drive flies, mosquitoes, and other flying pests back to where they came from so they stop bothering us in our yards? Short answer: you can’t. If you don’t cover your property with a mosquito net, insects will get into your yard. They are small, they can fly, and you are not their master.

However, you can reduce the number of flies that appear around and prevent infestation and reproduction.

How to reduce the number of flies in the yard

The key to reducing the number of pests flying around your yard is to first ask yourself what the flies are doing in your yard. What are they looking for? What do they want ? Spoiler : they mostly need dirt.

House flies, fruit flies, blow flies and fungus gnats (!) are just some of the common types of “dirty flies” that plague us. They usually look for feces, garbage, dead animals (including hamburgers), spilled juice, decaying plant matter, and other biological debris. True to their name, they are drawn to the dirt. They want to lay their eggs in sewage and eat sewage. So if you want fewer flies, you need to start by being less messy.

Tips on how to stop attracting flies

The tips below will prevent infestation by various types of flies, so you should start with a thorough visual inspection and follow this advice:

• Do not leave animal waste on the lawn. There’s a reason why “…like flies in shit” is a common saying.
• Make sure trash can lids are closed and trash cans are clean.
• Keep compost at bay.
• Inspect your property for standing water and dispose of it.
• Mow your lawn regularly.

How to get rid of flies in a clean yard

So, you’ve cleaned out your trash cans and hauled the rotting horse carcass out onto the lawn. Awesome! But Muhi. Still. Come . Yes, they will. Maybe they’re breeding on your neighbor Gary’s compost heap, and they’re attracted to the smell of the hamburgers you cook or the jar of Mai Tais you spilled. Here are a few tips, but again, they can only reduce fly problems, not eliminate them.

• Use fans : Flies don’t like windy conditions, so an electric fan or two strategically placed on a picnic table or barbecue grill can keep the flies down. Also, it will remove the smell of your food from said food. You can use any type of fan – swing, box, platform, all right.
• Velcro : Velcro strips are good for killing (some) flying pests that plague your yard or home. You can make them yourself (but isn’t your time worth anything ?) or you can buy them. Either way: the sweet smell attracts pests to the strip, where they get stuck on the sticky surface until they starve to death. (As an added bonus, I have to believe the bastards are suffering .) Hang fly paper somewhere with little air movement (flies don’t like this). The rule of thumb, according to Texas A&M University , is “one 10″ strip per 1000 cubic feet of space. Install fly strips within 6 feet of the floor because most fly activity occurs near the ground.”
• Use fly bait : Products like QuickBayt , Golden Malrin , and MaxForce will attract flies with something sweet and poison them with something nasty, usually methomyl. They are effective and easy to use, but Methomyl is not suitable for animal or human consumption, so be extremely careful.
• Arrange a game of killing flies: maybe you need to change your mindset? Watching flies die can be fun on a lazy summer day; just ask Homer Simpson from Day of the Locust. I suggest the Zap-It fly racket if you’re going to get a lot of kills, or the Bug-A-Salt rifle if you’re more into the sport – it’s completely ineffective, but it’s so nice to shoot flies with salt blasts. .

Keep flies away from home

Assuming you don’t have a pile of rotting trash on your living room floor, your house probably doesn’t breed dirty flies, so the trick to keeping flies out of your house is to keep flies out of your house. Make sure your window screens are in good condition. Don’t leave doors open. Check places where they can get in, such as cracks in the attic or basement.

If a fly (or two, or 15) has gotten into your house, an old-fashioned fly swatter is your best bet (at least according to the New York Times ).

Things that DO NOT keep flies out of your yard

I am amazed, stunned and even excited by the amount of misinformation about flies on the internet. It’s as if houseflies have a network of secret troll farms in the Philippines spreading misinformation designed to keep them from being killed. (Honestly, I wouldn’t notice them.) Here are some dubious but common ways to repel flies.

• Citronella Candles : While insects, especially mosquitoes , are repelled by citronella, it’s a matter of scale. Any chemical that a candle releases quickly dissipates into the air around it. Bottom line: they don’t work.
• Water-filled plastic bag : According to many people on the internet, hanging a plastic bag filled with water (or water and coins) on your porch will repel flies without chemicals. (I mean, water is a chemical, but never mind.) The idea is that water refracts light, confusing the delicate eyes of flies, and coins glisten, so light—you know what, don’t even worry about it. This is stupid and doesn’t work .
• Essential Oils: Add “fly repellent” to the long list of things essential oils don’t do .
• Fly Repellent Plants: I don’t know for sure if planting basil, mint, rosemary, or any of a dozen other plants will repel flies to any great extent, but I do know that mosquito repellent plants are a lie .
• Sound repellents : There are many sound wave solutions on the market to control flies and other pests and parasites, but they do not work .
• Vinegar : Some people recommend using vinegar to repel flies. I can’t tell if this will work on house flies or not, but fruit flies are called vinegar flies because they love this stuff so much. So even if he kept one kind of fly, he might attract another.
• Irish Spring Soap: According to this Facebook post , hanging a bar of Irish Spring soap will keep flies away. Even if this soap did have a fly-repellent scent as claimed (and I’m sure it doesn’t), do you know how many bars you would have to hang to create a fly-blocking miasma around your yard? Use your head people.
• Insect Catchers: Insect catchers actually work too well. These ultraviolet rays attract and kill thousands of flying insects, but they are not the same insects. Instead of mosquitoes and flies, they mostly kill beneficial pollinators like moths and even parasitic wasps that kill pesky dirty flies. They exacerbate mosquito problems!
• Yellow Bulbs : These do not repel bugs, but may attract fewer insects than white bulbs.
• Venus flytrap farming: Venus flytraps don’t eat flies very often – like a fly a month – so growing in your garden will only work if you’re bothered by one or two specific flies.

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