Do you kill flies? How do you feel about it?

I'm a 4

flies and wasps get mercilessly zapped if they aren't quick enough to escape my electric zapper. I couldn't care less about them. Moths and bees get the VIP cup and piece of paper then carefully let out of the window package. I take a lot of relish in exterminating wasps cos I hate them - and still feel there is a score to settle with the nasty little fuckers in vengeance for when me and my son got attacked by a swarm of them a few years back.

When you do a lot of cooking there is no place for flies in a kitchen - they are a disease spreading enemy. I'd rather I could encourage them to exit the way they entered but zapping them is the only practical solution.

These flies must die

Straight-up murder. Zero qualms.

The fly paper in my kitchen currently boasts around 20-30 victims of various sizes, something about being on the edge of the fens means loads of flies every summer, if it were the occasional one I would feel differently

I open a window and encourage them to fly out then shout at them for being stupid when they can't find the opening. Who's the real stupid?

I beat them to death and i go slow

I kill flies with no qualms. Spiders get put outside alive. I would tolerate the latter as they would help with disposing of the former, but my wife is repulsed by them so they have to go.

Our main problem is ants which have made an extensive nest along the edge of the patio by the patio door and recently have been of the flying variety. I dispose of them using a spray called NIPPON which has a logo consisting of that weird font that people use when they want Roman script to look Far Eastern. Since it appears to have no Japanese connection and is made in Coalville, Leicestershire that seems a bit racist.

during the heatwave my compost bin was colonised by flies and every time I opened it they are all flying into my face and maggots were dropping off the lid onto my hands - it was vile. I haven't opened it for weeks and hope they might have died off/decided to cancel the job in this grim tomb without fresh kitchen waste and opportunities to exit, but I'm almost too scared to look tbh.

If we're just talking about flies inside the house getting into your food, I will make a token effort to let them go outside, but if the situation is too bad, I'll go after them. My weapon of choice is a spray bottle filled with soapy water, which usually slows them down enough to kill them after you knock them down. I've also kinda wanted to try one of these:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EesfhOGt9Kk

(the commercial is pretty douchey, but it does look effective)

The other day, there was a fly in my sink that I only noticed after it started to fill up. It got caught in the water. I watched it struggle for a few seconds, then I turned the water up to full power and forgot it (until now). It had its chance

In other words, option 3

XXXXP the name seems to imply that the ant poison is based on Japanese WWII-era chemical warfare experiments

I have become remarkably good at snapping a kitchen towel to kill common houseflies.

Generally, I will open a window/door to give them a brief opportunity to escape on their own, but if not, it's on.

WD40 kills any and all insects almost instantly. A little tip for homicidal insect haters there.

Oh god yes I absolutely MURDERED a palmetto bug with WD-40 once.

last summer, I had a fruit fly situation so I had to put out a bowl of apple cider vinegar to kill the fuckers and now they're back (although not nearly as bad as last year), anyone got a more effective method? should I just get an electric swatter

I saw an absolutely bonkers method involving letting a raw shrimp rot in water that drew in thousands of flies into a homemade trap but the maker did allow the stench was considerable.

The only thing I've actively hunted down and killed with extreme prejudice is yellowjackets. They're constantly building nests around (and somewhat recently INSIDE) my mom's house and they're just the assholes of the animal kingdom (okay, maybe second to humans). I do not feel bad, god smite them all.

Otherwise, outdoors I'll only swat things that are looking to suck my blood (mosquitos, fleas, ticks, etc.). Indoors, I have no truck with flies of the house- or fruit- varieties (though I usually just make vinegar traps for the latter). And also the horde of centipedes that live inside the walls of our building and zip across the bathroom floor when you flip on the light. I do feel a little bad about killing the ones that are just squicky, non-blood-sucking nuisances, though.

Anything else in the home, I make a concerted effort to relocate humanely. I have been known to carry mice in a shoebox long distances to release them into...well, presumably the wild but probably ultimately someone else's home, tbrr.

last summer, I had a fruit fly situation so I had to put out a bowl of apple cider vinegar to kill the fuckers and now they're back (although not nearly as bad as last year), anyone got a more effective method? should I just get an electric swatter

― bon ivermectin (Murgatroid), Friday, August 6, 2021 7:33 AM (two minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

In re: the vinegar traps I alluded to, you put the vinegar in a jar and then tape an inverted cone (with a tiny hole at the end) to the rim of the jar. Fruit flies go in and they can't get back out.

I think that's about right? Here's the story I was thinking of.

The mason jar trap with raw shrimp caught hundreds of flies after 4 days. But that was nothing compared to what was to come.

MWUAH HAH HAH HA H HAAAA

lol. I would use wine instead of vinegar. Also, you have to make sure that the hole at the bottom is large enough for fumes to escape and for the flies to get in, but small enough that the flies will have a hard time finding their way back out. Go for a bigger jar to smaller funnel hole ratio.

Oh, I saw a DIY trap for yellowjackets that used raw chicken and a bucket of water. It seemed very effective because YELLOWJACKETS LIKE TO TEAR OFF PIECES OF RAW MEAT AND CARRY THEM HOME.

I will also say that this method is not 100% effective in my experience. I've also done this with rotting bananas and once I get a sufficient number of flies trapped in there I've let them go outside. As opposed to drowning them in vino.

We occasionally have a fly hatching that gets inside (or hatches inside, shudder) either because flies get in the basement from the garage, or flies get in the kitchen while the door is open for the cats. I'm talking hundreds of flies swirling around inside the house. It's apocalyptic. We use fly strips and I hang them under bright lights overnight or in the windows where the flies go for light & warmth. I'm trying one of those traps next time.

Q: do you live in the Amityville house, y/n

The horror in this house is going to be me if my boyfriend doesn't get around to putting the cat flap in the porch door so the flies don't get in in the first place.

I trapped a spider underneath a glass,
I kept it for a week to see how long he'd last.

There was an old lady who swallowed a fly
I don't know why she swallowed a fly but that's okay and here's why

...perhaps it's a vibe

flies yea but spiders etc I try to escort out with a paper towel or something

i learned to like spiders when I lived in a roach-infested house. fuckers were slaughtering the roaches and I was a-ok with that

I love spiders. If they end up in my way, I'll just relocate them to a houseplant or whatever corner seems the least used by my family members.

yeah I like spiders, my partner is scared of them tho

thought this was another thread about getting killflied

Spiders are awesome and easier on the eyes than house centipedes, which are admittedly even more effective at keeping one's home bug-free.

Flies get the spray immediately. Way too many flies this year btw. Moths get swatted or crushed in my hand. Zero tolerance for those. I've become inconsistent with roaches - I'll kill the small ones but sometimes just ignore the slightly bigger ones. But the massive Florida-sized ones are just too gross, they have to die too. Yesterday I tried to rinse a smaller roach down the kitchen drain but it struggled so valiantly to get away that I decided to let it live on, waterlogged. I realize this is stupid. I'm getting soft on roaches. Spiders I will not kill at all. Overall I've developed more and more guilt about killing things that aren't an immediate threat, or aren't intensely annoying.

i have a primal fear of spiders, there were wolf spiders in the basement of childhood home. i know they're good but whatever happens to them now i've no clue. leave it to my partner to deal with

I wonder whether spiders can rid you of a bed bug infestation. House centipedes certainly can.

my cats are more likely to kill a fly than i am

absolutely no quarter for insects of any kind in my apartment

I increasingly feel bad when I kill insects, but it must be done. Except for house centipedes, those should not exist and I don't feel bad about it, lol @ my friend who tried to convince me that they're apex predators and should be left alive to kill the other insects. I would rather have any other insect than those.

Moths, fireflies, some spiders, and some unidentified harmless flying insects get the cup & paper escort outside.

Today I learned about house centipedes.

I would have no qualms about swatting a fly inside but I usually try to lure them outside, simply because its less messy. I also squash centipedes and cockroaches inside with no qualms, and set poison out for ants. Spiders I leave alone.

I wish I could unlearn about house centipedes.

I don't know what they're even doing in my building, as this is otherwise the most pest-free place I've ever lived. Go where there are bugs to eat!

Slow-moving flies are also fairly easy to catch in your hand and release outside. I'll do that if they're not near a door.

My dog has become obsessed with chasing and eating flies, I think it's good for him to have a hobby.

I don't know what they're even doing in my building, as this is otherwise the most pest-free place I've ever lived.

Cause and effect.

I hear some people keep larger house centipedes as pets, especially in Asia.

i'm too lazy to kill flies like i used to tbh

can't believe all the poll options didn't include the phrase 'would (not) smash' tbh

Truly a shame.

stinkbugs get caught in kleenex and then flushed down the toilet.

Options 1 and 5: I kill flies and feel fine about it, and I am a saint and friend to all creatures. The flies know they are evil and crave oblivion. My gift to them is death.

https://i.imgur.com/U9IunrI.png

thank you calzino for reminding me of the existence of electric fly swatters. the bastards have been a plague lately

Inside my home I do whatever is necessary to keep bugs from taking up residency. Some bugs are quite harmless and are easy to usher outdoors and so that is what I do. More often they are uncooperative, evasive, and noisome and I kill them without further qualms.

Outdoors is different. There I generally kill only such bugs as wish to sup upon my blood, which definitely includes those nasty biting flies.

I killed a fly today
To see if I still feel

i won't kill em in the house, as i want my spiders to eat!

I only ever see fruit flies getting trapped in the permitted kitchen webs, and then often the spider has either died or fucked off before this bounty landed on them. They are next to useless as fly control.

yeah I hate spiders but I mostly leave them alone, and over the last few weeks my house has been full of flies. WTF spiders? we had a deal.

I put up fly paper and that caught about 50-60 of them but it's so gross to look at. but now there's only about 5 or so hardcore fuckers who taunt me by landing on the tube at the bottom which has no glue in it, so I guess it did work

I haven't seen flypaper since my gran's house in Kerry during the 80's - I thought it was an old world thing, but multiples in this thread use it!

I bought a box on Amazon, there are something like 50 reels in there, we use 5 a year, tops. a decade of files caught for a fiver.

On a Fly drinking out of his Cup

BUSY, curious, thirsty fly!
Drink with me and drink as I:
Freely welcome to my cup,
Couldst thou sip and sip it up:
Make the most of life you may,
Life is short and wears away.

Both alike are mine and thine
Hastening quick to their decline:
Thine's a summer, mine's no more,
Though repeated to threescore.
Threescore summers, when they're gone,
Will appear as short as one!

William Oldys. 1687–1761

don't reckon grasshoppers will have much of a longer lifespan if they keep posting jolly old-timey existential horror poems

"gadzooks! how my time has flown. it all seems just like yesterday i was a lad. ah well! eternal salvation awaits!"

either that or william oldys was the chillest dude alive, maybe i should aspire to his level of zen

it is a maddeningly good poem

our house is strangely absent of flies. i think it must be the cat. good kitty!

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

i must need new cats, because i have 2 and they've probably caught 2 between them. maybe that's the problem - they are efficient spider hunters, which is fine by me cos i hate spiders, but now there's loads of flies? i have to rethink this strategy

Where’s “I try killing them but I’m bad at it”?

This morning I waved a small wasp out of the window but it got caught in what I'd thought was an abandoned web just outside. Well, the web was not abandoned and little spider quickly imobilised waspy and it's now in the corner being digested by enzimes n' shit. Who needs to go on safari.

Enzymes

oh the spiders in my house are more than capable of dealing with flies and such, they tend to struggle with kamikazi moths that will literally destroy their whole nest of webs in seconds though.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

death to flies

these files had it coming all along

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kjAkE03y6VU

cold

flies are mostly fine but any mosquitos come around got a fucking death wish

flies are horrible disease vectors. i hate them

flies will not love you back

-Taylor Dayne

I'll never forget one of my first jobs, a lady was showing me how to enter some data on a terminal and a huge blue bottle fly landed next to my keyboard. I was about to go "aw look at that" and she immediately swatted it dead. I was horrified.

Flies are whatever, but my wife has apparently developed a reaction to bee/wasp stings recently and is on steroids again for the second time in a month! Her poor face is horribly swollen.

Was she stung in the face or stung elsewhere and the reaction spread to her face? Facial stings do tend to swell up really bad.

Face, but she is well on her way to having her eye swollen shut in under 24 hrs so she had an online consult with urgent care.

Also, the sting a couple of weeks ago blew up half her arm on either side of her elbow.

I feel like she got stung a couple years ago and nothing like this happened. OTOH, her younger sister has developed something similar in recent years with any bug bite so I guess it runs in the family.

https://www.usnews.com/dims4/USNEWS/b74235a/2147483647/thumbnail/970x647/quality/85/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fmedia.beam.usnews.com%2F5d%2Fb2%2F3f837495477ea47f1f5264ccbfb4%2F201008-pencefly-editorial.jpg

https://nypost.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2020/10/jeff-goldblum-the-fly.jpg