We’ve all been there: You’ve decided to whip up a big fruit salad, when out of the corner of your eye, you see a bug fly by the bowl housing your bananas. “Maybe there’s just one,” you muse optimistically. But when it comes to fruit flies, where there’s one, there are many. In fact, it takes just one week for two fruit flies to multiply to 500. And while they’re more of a nuisance than a major threat to your health, their behavior isn’t exactly appetizing: Like houseflies, fruit flies vomit on food before they eat it, so if you’ve got an infestation, it means your produce is covered in bug barf. While this might make you want to swear off fresh fruit for good, the good news is that there are some simple, safe, and effective ways to evict these irritating insects, so you can go back to enjoying your favorite produce without worrying what might be lurking on it.
Where do fruit flies come from?
In most cases, fruit flies arrive via what they love most — your fruit. According to P&G entomologist Daniel Perry, “They usually hitchhike into your home on produce that you buy at the supermarket.” Most fruit fly infestations start from nearly microscopic eggs that travel with the fruit from wherever it’s grown. They’re drawn to the sugars released as your bananas or apples start to ripen, so if you’ve left fruit on the counter, they may also buzz themselves in through tiny cracks in your home to sniff out a snack.
Can you get fruit flies any time of year?
While it’s true that fruit flies prefer warmer climates, these also happen to be the regions where our produce comes from in the winter. “The fruit you eat in colder months comes from farms where the climate is hot and humid,” explains Perry. “Though fruit flies aren’t native to the U.S., they’ve spread to almost every continent and reproduce quickly. And even in freezing temperatures, once they’re inside your warm home, they’re likely to stay.”
How long do fruit flies live?
On average, fruit flies lay about 500 eggs at once, and it takes about a week for them to mature into the flies you can see buzzing around your home. In the right conditions, fruit flies can live between 40 and 50 days. One female can lay hundreds of eggs multiple times over the course of her life, giving new meaning to the words “be fruitful and multiply.”
Why are they so hard to get rid of?
Where there’s one fruit fly, there’s usually a whole family. ”If you see a fruit fly and kill it, even if that’s the only adult fruit fly in your whole house, it may have already laid hundreds of eggs,” says Perry. And if you’ve ever tried to swat a fruit fly, you know it’s no easy task: “Fruit flies have very fast reaction times because their brain processes visual information faster than ours do,” he explains. “So if you move to swat a fruit fly on the counter, it will sense the movement of your shadow and within milliseconds it’s already turning its body to fly in the opposite direction.”
How can you get rid of fruit flies?
Storing your seeded produce in your fridge, minimizing points of entry in your home, and keeping doors and windows closed can keep these parasites at bay. But if you’re not too keen on keeping your home on lockdown year-round, there’s another simple way to make your fruit fly problem a thing of the past.
Zevo, a small, discreet insect trap you plug into the wall, uses a combination of blue and UV light to attract fruit flies and then traps them in a sticky adhesive. Francez Curbelo, senior scientist at Zevo, explains: “Once you get the device, you just have to remove the refill liner that covers the glue and plug in the trap. The blue light will go on, and then it does the work for you.” Once the trap is full, simply discard it and replace it with a new one. If seeing a bunch of dead fruit flies gives you the ick, you’re in luck: There’s a tab on top of the trap that allows you to throw it away without having to touch the bugs. (Although if you’re morbidly curious about how many you’ve gathered, you can peel it back to take a peek.)
How do blue and UV light attract fruit flies?
Have you ever noticed that bugs go absolutely nuts when you turn a light on? Perry says entomologists have a theory as to why: “Fruit flies generally lay their eggs in dark, damp spaces, and once they hatch and emerge as adults, they’re ready to fly off and find mates,” he says. “They need a lit place to find a mate, so our hypothesis is that that’s what draws them to light.” Blue and UV light have proven to be the most effective sources in attracting fruit flies, so as long as the plug-in is visible to them, they’ll be drawn to it.
Does Zevo work on other bugs?
Plant lovers will be glad to hear that Zevo also works on gnats, those tiny black bugs you might see hovering around (and potentially damaging) your indoor foliage. While Zevo was specifically designed for fruit flies, house flies, and gnats, there are plenty of other flying insects that are also attracted to UV light, so you never know what you might catch.
The next time you reach for a banana and a fruit fly zips past your face, don’t panic — just know it’s time to plug in your plan of attack. With a bit of help from a little blue light, you can reclaim your fruit bowl without worrying whether there are hundreds of critters about to start a party on your pineapple.
