To Kill a Fruit Fly

Tomotoes are the biggest culprit of the Fruit Fly.

Readers,

Well, as a result of gardening and bringing in the produce, you get the dreaded Fruit Fly. Forget Ebola! Try getting rid of Fruit Flies!  (kidding, that ebola will be a blog post I bet.)

For the past few weeks I have been trying to bring about their demise. I think I have just about killed all of them and their families that have descended on our house this fall. Sure, I still see one try to fly up my nose or smell my breath while I eat fruit but for the most part they are gone!

 

Yah- hoo!

(P.S. how cute is that daisy up there? It was one of the "salvaged ones" adopted by me at the end of summer when a big store was throwing them out. And P.P.S, Aren't you glad I blog so the questions you think to yourself such as: "what does she do all day anyway?", can be answered? Yup, I do the tasks no one thinks of like the Fruit Flies.)

The secret? Vigilance! Every night the experts online tell us,  out the garbage should go! Other online  tips on getting rid of them:

The sink has to be cleaned and boiling water poured down it to kill the eggs.

 

Wah?????????????????????????????????????

 

(Look at this lone Sunflower. Readers, I used to have Mammoth Sunflowers- below-






 dotting my garden before this dumb disease took an even bigger turn downward. Look at the contrast of the sunflower in full bloom during summertime vs. fall and me not giving them proper care...Gosh dang!)

Back to the Fruit Fly.....



 EVERY NIGHT, Readers.  (the sink is their haven. well, one of them. the garbage disposal must be a nice gurgling lullaby to the babies.) Who is able to do this  I ask?? Clean out sinks, not listen to the garbage disposal to put you to sleep. Maybe I should try that when I have a rough night of prednisone.

No wonder things like ebola in 3rd world countries are hard to get a handle on. If we can't get ahold of the tiny Fruit Fly..

Well, some people might be able to get a handle on things. For me, it's hard. When trying to taper off prednisone, pioneer Entyvio, and it's football season- I don't have much energy.

So, I hate to take the credit for getting rid of them myself. It has been a group effort. Madre has been stealth like with the fly zapper whenever we have a meal. She could be the Fruit Fly Whisperer.. She slowly moves in on them when they are sitting on the edge of dish full of yellow pineapple when suddenly ZAPPO! She gets them when they go in for a lick!

 

(Padre let me borrow his camera the other day. I could barely hold it up without my wrist brace. But I promised you to start uploading some pics. I had to take some of them first. Which was a chore.)



I went ahead and told Padre that it wasn't necessary to try and hold onto the tomato plants as they weren't necessarily cost effective if I had to bring in a Hazmat Crew to get rid of Fruit Flies vs. just buying some at the store. ( No, we didn't get any of them canned this year. As is the point, I think, of gardening. Along with teaching us to be resourceful, independent, so on and so forth.)

The real reason we are rid of them is this:



 I bought 3. It brought the little annoying, hovering, and exceptionally quick flies out of the wood work.
When I first got them, I had to watch what the little fellas would do. Oddly a few of them just sat there, on the edge of the apple, as if they were suspicious of it; contemplating whether or not to enter it like they had seen a commercial on the trap. They must not have been able to ignore the tempting red liquid inside cause I have seen them floating around in the apples.

Side note: I went to find a picture of my trap and ran across a site that tells about the Fruit Fly.
One question they answered that I wanted to know was:

"Where does it [the fruit fly] Come From?"

Answer: "Outside."

Well, duh.



then this paragraph below, about the larvae grossed me out so I will share it so you can be grossed out too:

 "The fruit fly is instantly attracted to any type of substance that is in the process of decaying and is considered to be sour. This could include residue on the interior regions of trash containers, spills on counters and floors, wet cloths, mop heads that have a high concentration of moisture and food particles in cracks and crevices. In addition to this, these insects are highly attracted to drains and drainage pipes that have deposits of organic matter."

*That explains the pouring boiling water down the drains!

(Even being ignored these petunias lit up during the past few days. Tonight it is freezing so this was their last day to shine.)



Does that mean ALL the drains? Or just the ones in a kitchen?

So we now know that the fruit fly comes from outside. And you have to be able to get all the dishes done before you go to bed or else the fruit flies will be hanging their stockings on the mantle next to yours at Christmas time.

How do you Readers stay on top of cleaning? All I know is that the laundry is going pretty much all the time since I decided that J. could go ahead and just wear his clothes once to school and shed them when he gets home.

 

Thank you, enterovirus!

Thank you for making us feel that much more guilt and stress about cleaning!

Ya know those moments when you are just at wits end and the end of the day?

 When the dishes have hung around for a few days next to the sink,  or in the sink,  and you accidenttly left a load of laundry in the wash so it has to be REWASHED? And you find out that you left it there to be re-washed  when you need a jersey washed really quick in time for a game?



(readers, I tried to capture the stages of the berries... I think it got too dark.)

Do you find yourself at wit's end and you still have to figure out what to fix for dinner but you don't feel like eating yourself but know the kid (s) will really be wanting a nice meal cause football practice is rough. And now it's getting cold outside?

Oh, and you are bare foot and walking around noticing the build up of crumbs which makes you realize you also need to mop the floor. Anyone know what I am talking about?

No stinking wonder the Fruit Flies love that bunch of bananas I am holding onto in order to make banana bread- yeh, right!  I always feel guilty throwing any of them away cause banana bread is SO good. Once the banans are black really the bread is out of the question.

It's in those "Wit's Ends"  moments you feel desperate. Which may make you want to pick up a cheap pizza with absolutely no nutritional value. And try to ignore the fact they may not wash their hands as well as you do or running a fever cause they were on a plane with someone who helped somone in Dallas, Texas who had Ebola.

(another random backyard pic)



I guess I don't have to be so perfect with things. Instead of trying to get the sheets changed once a week just let them go until you the bed bugs ask to get a breather.

 But I have felt it my job to keep the house clean for the troupes. Or at least disinfectd. We have grandkids over. We have a big family. I live here. I get to stay home cause I am sick. So I get feeling the need to do what I can. But it is hard. And my predicament makes me see things from a possible epidemic stand point.

Fortunately none of us have gotten sick. I mean sick, sick.

At his elementary all the kids have been through the coughing and sneezing and now are onto some stomach flu virus. One of the teachers I talked to has been sick and going through Lysol wipes by the dozens.

I have felt bad. Almost to the point of ordering a haz mat suit online and going in after school each day and hosing it down. Oh wait. I can barely walk. hmmm... makes it hard. I guess all I can do is cheer them on.

And get rid of Fruit Flies. Somebody has to, right?



(Nephew watching his cousin ride passed the window on his bike and do tricks. I do the same thing; watch from the window and knock on it if the kid on the bike gets too "rowdy".)

Speaking of traps and living in my parent's basement-  the spiders are coming in. Hate those guys more than the Fruit Fly. So I set out my sticky card board traps. You won't guess what happened the other day!

I had to do a good cleaning in the bathroom with some Lysol. That stuff can kill ya. So I opened the windows downstairs. It was a beautiful day and with the fans running it really felt good. It also helped air out the place and bring down the toxic fumes a notch.

That night J. was in my room and noticed a spider slowly lowering itself down from the top of my window. A- HAH! I dared it to land right on my trap. In fact, I made sure it did by picking up the trap and holding it below it so it could get stuck. And guess what? It walked across it. I had to turn it over and do some quick thinking!

Which meant I just crushed it on it's second round of the trap. So now what? Yeh, there were some spiders that had gotten stuck. Small gnats. So that was comforting to know the traps I have set don't work!

(Why do little kids love the movie Cars so much? Jaden couldn't get enough of it either.This little guy found a cookie he'd smashed into the DVD and finished it off later...too funny.)

 



I think I want new windows in our bedrooms. 

Isn't it nice to get a random blog post? Take the mind off of things. And share information. Well, my hands are hurting from typing. This post has taken a few days to put together.