The Best DIY Fruit Fly Trap
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Are fruit flies driving you nuts? Never fear, this DIY fruit fly trap is sure to help.
I tested a bunch of ways to get rid of these pests, but this easy homemade fruit fly trap came out as the winner! Read on to find simple the end to your fruit fly woes.
If you eat a lot of veggies and fruits in your home, then likely fruit flies have been a part of your home as well. Sigh. For that very reason, this past week I had reason to work on finding the best fruit fly trap. Somehow we got inundated with them and had to find a way to get rid of them. Fast.
Those little buggers multiply fast and they were well — driving me buggers!
I scoured the internet to figure out the best way to nab these little pests – but one fruit fly trap worked much better than the others.
First however, I'm going to share with you some annoying and almost terrifying fruit fly facts:
Facts About Fruit Flies
Did you know these?
– Mother fruit flies can lay about 500 eggs at a time
– The most likely place for a mother fruit fly to lay her eggs is in a piece of fermenting food.
– As soon as the babies hatch, they start reproducing very rapidly
– From the time the mother fruit fly lays her eggs until you see the fruit flies buzzing around is about 7-13 days. Yikes! – instead of saying how things “multiply like rabbits”—should we change the saying to “multiply like fruit flies”? (source)
See why it's so important to get rid of these pesky critters right away? If you don't, you could have hundreds in a very short amount of time.
Well, this past week we tried 3 different methods to get rid of these flies and I think we've found the winner.
DIY Fruit Fly Traps We Tested
Trap #1 – Hands
Yes, I'm not kidding. This is the way I've always caught fruit flies and we've always been successful in the past. But this time, the flies were getting the best of us. I'm guessing that you all probably have used this method too, right?
I'm sure you can imagine myself and my two sons standing the kitchen, climbing on step stools, clapping our hands together and slapping cabinets, trying to get rid of every last one.
(I can't believe how smart these little buggers seem to be. They really seemed to know that they blended well into our dark kitchen cabinets and hid there almost completely invisible. Almost.)
We all thought this was fun (kind of) for awhile, but it got old after awhile.
And standing on a step stool trying to catch fruit flies is an accident waiting to happen.
It was time to find a new way.
Trap #2 – Apple Cider Vinegar and Dish Soap
This method is supposed to work by putting some apple cider vinegar in a bowl or jar and then adding a drop or so of dish soap. The dish soap is supposed to create tension across the top of the apple cider vinegar. The vinegar attracts the flies. They fly in and the soap traps them there.
Tried this for about 5 days.
The result?
Only 2 flies dead. Not anywhere near enough to make a dent in our burgeoning fruit fly colony.
Trap #3 – Inverted Cone
With this method, you put something attractive to the fruit flies in a container and invert a cone (paper is fine) so that it extends to the rim of the container.
The flies travel down the cone but can't get back up.
Never tried this because Number 4, the winner, worked so well. I don't think I'd bother with this because the other is much easier and a little nicer to look at. And once you see The Winner you'll see another reason why.
Trap #4 – The Winner!
I know – it's an icky photo. It's just stuff from my compost bowl with plastic wrap on top with a few tiny holes poked in it.
Perfect for attracting fruit flies, but not great for making pretty photos.
I love this fruit fly trap.
Why?
Why We Love This Trap
- First of all, it worked! At the height of our fruit fly troubles, I would catch 5, 10 or more flies in there and would take them out on our deck to let them all go.
- Secondly, it's cheap! (Basically, I just put plastic wrap on top of my compost bowl.) On Amazon, the fruit fly trap I looked at was more than $7. So you can save a bunch of money with this and get rid of your fruit flies effectively – and you don't need to wait for the trap to arrive in the mail!
It's also cheaper than using my high quality apple cider vinegar which I love and really don't wish to waste on fruit flies. - Third, I didn't have to put another thing on my countertop since I could just use my compost bowl. Who needs something else on the whole foods countertop, right?
Important Notes
The original post instructed people to let the fruit flies out of the trap outdoors, after catching them, but some readers pointed out that this would only serve to make the fruit fly problem worse. After doing some research, I realized what a huge problem the fruit fly population is and so I changed the post.
Now you simply let the flies die in with the fruit.
Or better yet, you kill the flies while they're in the bowl just to make sure that they don't escape.
They tend to go to the edge of the bowl to try to get out, so you can just squash them there so that there's simply no escape!
Here's how to to make your Fruit Fly Trap.
The Best DIY Fruit Fly Trap
Ingredients
- bowl
- fruit or food items
- plastic wrap
- toothpick or other sharp item
- dish soap
Instructions
- Place some fruit or other food items in a bowl.
- Add a drop or two of dish soap.
- Secure a plastic wrap over the top and secure, if necessary, with a rubber band.
- Poke small holes in the top of the plastic wrap (with a toothpick, the sharp end of a knife, or something like that).
Notes
More DIY Healthier Household Ideas
– Amazing No Streak Glass Cleaner
– DIY Plastic Wrap Substitute
– DIY Foaming Soap
– DIY Facial Oil Wash
– Natural Dishwasher Rinse Aid (3 Ways!)
– Homemade Laundry Detergent
– Best Eye Makeup Remover
Have you every tried a DIY fruit fly trap?
Have another pest problem you are battling?
We did Mason jars with fruit, dawn dish soap, and water.. then put plastic wrap(clingy plastic) cannot think of the name AT ALL! & poked holes with a fork, about 4 times, they could get in, but couldn’t climb out (the ones that didn’t fly right to the bottom) because the wrap was pushed in and they would get all caught up in it and eventually ended up in the soapy rotted fruit water.. sounds so fantastic! Yughhhh… :/
Yay! Good for you.
We just puta banana peel in the bottom of a plastic bag, pull the ends up leaving a small opening at the top and then close it quick. They seem to love the banana in a bag here.
Interesting!
Thank you! This really is the best!!! I’m just as happy to let the little buggers go outside rather than having to dispose of their bodies. 🙂
Thank you and I agree!
Flypaper suspended from the bottom of a cupboard and down into a plastic cup. Add a bit of red wine at the bottom. Not exactly home made, but I caught a ton of them in just the first few minutes! The wine is very aromatic and attracts them from all over the kitchen.
Nice tip!!! Thanks!
To an insect, water molecules are large balls that they can walk on.
Soap breaks the water down into much smaller “balls” that they can’t walk on and sink.
This is how soap cleans by making the water able to get into smaller places.
I am learning all kinds of new things today.
When I was a young country boy, there was a kind of insect that would skate on the surface of water such as a creek or pond.
If one would pour a few drops of soap on the water, the bug would sink.
Thinking back on it, I feel bad for killing them for no reason.
The reason soap cleans things is that it breaks the water molecules into smaller parts.
If you can imagine the water as large balls that the bug can skate on and change them to BB size so they can”t.
Skitter bugs – that’s what we used to call them.
We LOVED your idea number 4 and the apple cider vinegar one. We actually did number 4 and also put some apple cider vinegar in a small lid and covered it up just like with number 4. We put them side by side. The apple cider vinegar one has killed LOTS of the flies and number 4 has been used to “successfully relocate” many fruit flies to the great outdoors. Thanks for the blog with the GREAT ideas. They have helped save my sanity. 🙂
Thank you for the kind words and for reading. Much appreciated!!! Hope to see you around again.
My father had a huge fruit fly problem so my brother and I went on a mission to find the best fruit fly trap. We tried all the ones you listed plus a few more. The best solution we found was a glass jar filled about 1/4 full with Triple sec and a couple drops of dish soap with a piece of cantaloupe in the bottom. We covered it with plastic wrap, poked several holes in it and set one in the sink next to the drain and one on the counter. Within 24 hours all the flies were gone. I imagine just about any sweet liqueur/rotten fruit combo would work but we had the best results with Triple sec and cantaloupe. The sweet smell lures them in, the soap reduces surface tension so the flies can’t sit on top of the liquid and the liqueur gets them drunk and drowns them (Hey, at least they die happy!). Just make sure the holes are fairly big so they can find their way in easily. They’ll be too drunk to find their way back out.
Ha!!!
i may use Chinese Insecticide Chalk around the edge of the glass where the fruit fly attract to the smell . i want to sêeì it really work , because to toxic may kill the bug before fly hatch thí way it may get rid òf them all. I can not wait until i have Chinese Insecticide Chalk. Will let you know .
Wow! I chopped up my banana peel, put it in a small glass bowl and covered with Saran Wrap.
Poked some small holes and they came!
Thank you!
You are welcome!! 🙂
I use trap #2 version with a glass bottle of coke emptied. The difference is I placed a teaspoon of sugar with apple cider vinegar and about 5 drops of dawn dish soap. It kill about 20 of them in a week and the next two weeks about 12 once the eggs hatched.
What does the Dawn do? Thanks!
It makes the liquid have a different surface tension so the fruit flies drown.
Thanks!
Dawn (soap in general) is a surfactant… which means that when it is dissolved in a liquid it will reduce the Surface Tension of that liquid. Surface Tension is the property of water that allows you to fill a glass with water until it crowns over the top of the glass, i.e., overfill the glass without spilling. This same Surface Tension allows insects to walk on water/ liquid.
Reducing / eliminating the Surface Tension will help to ensure that the fruit flies can not fly away after landing on the apple cider vinegar.