I have found a 3 ingredient recipe that repels flies – a £2.55 portion will last for years
IF electric light or fly traps don’t reduce the number of flies in your home, this recipe may help.
A homeowner shared a DIY trick he uses to keep insects out of his house.
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In his viral videothe TikTok user (@that40yearguy) revealed the recipe he had found after trying his whole life to tackle his fly problem.
“You’re telling me I could have done this, after 40 years of fighting flies and the smell of stinking flytraps?” he asked his audience.
The poster said you need an empty water bottle for the trick.
He cut off the top third of the bottle and turned it upside down, creating a funnel.
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Then he measured a teaspoon of honey and mixed it with 60 grams of brown sugar.
The experts of Proterra Pest Control explained why you really do catch more flies with honey.
They explained that the insects are attracted to the sweet ingredient and can easily get stuck in the sticky substance.
Flies are also attracted to sugar, making this combination deadly to pests.
Diluting the ingredients with 235 milliliters of water makes the mixture even more effective.
A jar of honey is available from shops such as Tesco for as little as 75p.
You can also buy a bag of brown sugar for £1.80, bringing your recipe total to just £2.55.
The TikToker noted that these ingredients also have a long shelf life, allowing you to repeat the process for years to come.
As a final step, the poster placed the homemade fly trap outside to test its effectiveness.
When he returned after letting the mixture sit for a few hours, he noticed that there were a “ton” of flies in the mixture.
He added that the homemade stuff also has no odor, making it ideal for home use.
Why do flies appear in the summer?
Flies are present all year round, but once summer comes, they are suddenly EVERYWHERE!
The main factors contributing to this are the breeding cycle of flies and rising temperatures.
Insects are cold-blooded and in summer, when their body temperature rises due to external heat, they become more active.
The warmer weather also causes them to seek out cool, damp places, such as indoors, to escape the stifling heat and to lay their eggs.
It takes about 20 hours for house fly eggs to hatch, but if temperatures rise above 37 degrees they can hatch in as little as 8 hours!
In extremely hot weather, the eggs can develop from larvae to adult flies within four days.
The average lifespan of a housefly is 21 days, so each female can lay up to 900 eggs in the summer months!
TikTok users shared their thoughts on the hack in the comments.
“Remember the old saying, ‘Honey attracts more flies’, [I] “I think it’s true,” one viewer wrote.
“You not only saved my mind, you may have saved the world,” said another impressed follower.
“No pesticides, so I can feed them to the chickens!” pointed out a third person.
“When I say I hate flying I get the chills and a bunch of them come into the house. I’m going to do this now!!” another TikToker commented.
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