Step 8: What should be obvious
Basic construction and theory covered, we need to look at the factors involved in getting the bugs to think of your trap as a good idea:
1) The bait doesn't have to be stinky. Forget having to find raw hamburger and letting it sit for several days. Leftovers are just fine. Think what flies like, beer, old spaghetti, bread.
2) I like to keep the slots in the bait tray about 1/4 inch. It keeps them from finding their way out of the bait tray back to the environment, and channel them toward the greater light to the cage. More slots allow the smell to circulate, flaps help to keep the light down.
3) The smell is the best attractant. If the smell doesn't get out then the flies won't come to it. While you can construct the trap with solid pieces of plastic cut from say a 2 liter bottle, it's better to just take apart an old screen.
4) You will need to cure the smells from the glue and paint. Flies avoid petroleum because they will get stuck and/or poisoned.
5) Having one big trap will work best in areas where you need to catch a lot of flies, like Cow Barns, Baseball Games, Horse Stables, and Church Socials. Having several small traps set around the yard will catch more flies in the general sense.
6) The longer the traps stay out, the more flies you take out of the local population. That translates into less flies able to breed. I just take the cage and put it in the freezer for an hour or two. The flies grow numb, stop moving, and then freeze to death.
7) If you have Fish, Turtles, or Chickens, you can make food out of them like this. If you want to save your flies, keep them in an airtight jar in the freezer. They get nasty and full of maggots (Yeah Really!) if you keep them next to the fishtank.
8) Save your Tuna Fish cans. Using them as bait holders in the bait chamber saves hours of cleanup time, especially after the flies have started a little family in the bait there. Throw out the old bait, rinse out the can, put in fresh bait! Breeding flies would be self-defeating...
9) Having other foods around like an uncovered trashcan will attract more flies. They will want to hover there rather than the smell of the trap.
1) The bait doesn't have to be stinky. Forget having to find raw hamburger and letting it sit for several days. Leftovers are just fine. Think what flies like, beer, old spaghetti, bread.
2) I like to keep the slots in the bait tray about 1/4 inch. It keeps them from finding their way out of the bait tray back to the environment, and channel them toward the greater light to the cage. More slots allow the smell to circulate, flaps help to keep the light down.
3) The smell is the best attractant. If the smell doesn't get out then the flies won't come to it. While you can construct the trap with solid pieces of plastic cut from say a 2 liter bottle, it's better to just take apart an old screen.
4) You will need to cure the smells from the glue and paint. Flies avoid petroleum because they will get stuck and/or poisoned.
5) Having one big trap will work best in areas where you need to catch a lot of flies, like Cow Barns, Baseball Games, Horse Stables, and Church Socials. Having several small traps set around the yard will catch more flies in the general sense.
6) The longer the traps stay out, the more flies you take out of the local population. That translates into less flies able to breed. I just take the cage and put it in the freezer for an hour or two. The flies grow numb, stop moving, and then freeze to death.
7) If you have Fish, Turtles, or Chickens, you can make food out of them like this. If you want to save your flies, keep them in an airtight jar in the freezer. They get nasty and full of maggots (Yeah Really!) if you keep them next to the fishtank.
8) Save your Tuna Fish cans. Using them as bait holders in the bait chamber saves hours of cleanup time, especially after the flies have started a little family in the bait there. Throw out the old bait, rinse out the can, put in fresh bait! Breeding flies would be self-defeating...
9) Having other foods around like an uncovered trashcan will attract more flies. They will want to hover there rather than the smell of the trap.
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arirang777
says:
Jun 29, 2009. 12:19 PMReply
OMG! I didn't know about the rambo fly you were able to spot. Maybe a new species developing around nuclear plants. One question, Cptn: Will you get only flies or also some other flying insects like bees, lady bugs, lacewings. wasps, etc. My neighbour got some traditional nectar traps but they caught EVERYTHING, so for the last few years we had have terrible infestations of aphids in everything with sap/green. I want to evict flies, not the good guys. Thanks!
1
CapnChkn (author)
in reply to Jul 2, 2009. 6:53 AMReply
Oh! I hadn't noticed the question until now. Actually I get teh Woof spiders. They look so cute and everything when they're looking at the flies in the jar and so on, but you know how it is. Every so often one of them gets in and then it's problems getting them out. I usually try to chill them before they freeze, separate, and block freeze the rest of the biomass. I have, on occasion, caught Cockroaches, I get Ants by the handful, and once caught a Black Soldier Fly. If you set the space in the slots to "Fly Size," you strain out the big ones, use of food as bait instead of say, Jelly Doughnuts, keeps the endangered bees out of the mix, Etc. So to summarize. If you bait your trap with a horse, you will get horse flies. If you bait the trap with Elephants, you will catch Elephant flies.
vv00dy
says:
May 10, 2009. 5:11 AMReply
Good and simple. I like it. I think I'll catch and release spiders into mine. Yes I have a name for my fly trap, I call it the Octagon.
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