Battle Strategy Number One: We took one Rubbermaid plastic dish, poured in apple cider vinegar, placed plastic wrap on the top, secured plastic with a rubber band, and then finally perforated the plastic with a few small holes at the top. It's a Roach Motel simulator. The vinegar attracts the flies, so they fly into the hole but can't fly back out. Then we donned our ceremonial gear and circled the dish while chanting "Shoo Fly Don't Bother Me". As attested by the numerous carcasses, the insects dropped like, well you know. This is one use for Rubbermaid products you will probably never see advertised.
Battle Strategy Two: This is a simple rinsed out Kroger yogurt cup. We mixed and poured a concoction of apple cider vinegar, a dash of liquid dish soap, and a small teaspoon of sugar together into the cup. The soap is supposedly toxic to the fruit fly and they drown. This battlefield has seen much less casualties but ultimately, I, The Smiling Infidel reigned victorious in the siege.
Usually I'm characterized as a child of nature, friend to man, but we all harbor a potential killing machine within ourselves.
11 comments:
Between your death traps and your killer cleavage, you'll have the entire world eradicated from pesky insects in no time!
And (I just can't let this one go)you harbor your potential killing machine inside your brassiere. ;-)
I want to know what is appealing to you about living in Houston. Cockroaches that put on sunglasses when you turn on the light, fruitflies, the red ants, the ticks, the fleas...? Is it the traffic? Is the days with 100% humidity?
Good luck in the ongoing battle! There are enough creepie crawlies to keep you busy forever!
Good eradication, infidel! (Lotsa bugs and humidity= I don't think I will move to Texas after all.)
1) Ew, bugs. I am NOT a friend to nature. I only want to go outside to mow and play golf.
2) If you find any strategies that will kill larder beetles as effectively as what you have demonstrated here kills fruit flies, please do let me know.
Thank you Julie. Apparently I need to have my "booby trap" licensed aa a concealed weapon here in Texas. Although if I join a nudist colony all such stipulations wouldn't apply as they would no longer be "concealed".
elizabeth, we live in %100 humidity because of the big savings we enjoy on not having to buy moisturizer or winter parkas and tire chains. The only bug that truly bugs me are the cockroaches. They really squick me out.
wendela, the "immigrants" seem to think that they own California and Texas. We both may have to evacuate to Mexico to live peacefully on the beach because it seems as all their citizens are packing up and moving here. Our very own country wendela, and they have burritos!!!!
I bought overly green bananas 2 weeks ago and I think these camouflaged my leetle fruit fly friends, just like enemies packed into a Trojan Horse.
Omar, I don't know what larder beetles are and I'm not volunteering my custom booby trap to kill them either. Maybe your wife can assist with you that.
Hey! I've been reading your blog for months now and I think it is GREAT just as it is!
I buy green bananas all the time, and don't get fruit flies. That's odd.
So glad you did this experiment though, because I do sometimes get them here. Now I know what to do!
I have a pet garden spider. It's green with red diamond shaped coloured markings on it's underside. I had one in my garden as a kid and I'd catch grasshoppers and crickets to feed it. My own personal 3-D animal kingdom. Spiders are awesome. When I was in Kuwait there were these Camel spiders. I don't know where they got there name but I heard they burrow into camels and lay there eggs there, and the camels are unwitting hosts to these big ol' spiders in their flesh. Anyways, these spiders got as big as your hand (well, my hand-I haven't seen any of yours') and moved extremely fast. Freaked us out. We'd find these equally huge scorpions and pit the spiders vs. the scorpions. The scorpions won usually. Big mean looking mothers...These camel spiders didn't have the traditional fangs; there jaws were similar to bear traps. They had both upper and lower jaws and their abdomens were hourglass shape. Freaky looking alien things. Hmmm...it is just a part of nature for everything coming out of the Middle East to be fudged-up.
I think the 'potential' label would be misapplied with respect to your deadly weapons. 'Convicted killers' seems more accurate.
Not that there's anything wrong with that. Them. Those. Whatever.
*tries to stop digging deeper hole*
elastic, beach life sounds good to me. Is it ok with Mrs. Sam that we use some of the "funds"?
(carrot, I think she is recoiling from the fact you could have beat her in the fruit fly competition. She's one competitive infidel and that's another reason we like her.)
I don't want to boast but I hold the title of "Miss Fruit Fly-Harris County". I wowed the judges with my Carmen Miranda impersonation while balancing a fruit fly filled fruit basket on my head. You gotta bring your best game to compete with me carrot.
wendela, I'm packing my itty bitty teeny weenie yellow polka dot thong bikini for our exodus to Mexico. What are you bringing?
Patrick, you made me have new found appreciation for Houston bugs because as plentiful and diverse and scary as they are they don't compare to those freaks of nature spiders in the Middle East. Oh, and you do seem like the kind of guy that would keep a spider for a pet.
radioactive, if silencing bugs permanently with my booby traps is a crime then let me stand guilty as charged.
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