Is there anything more aggravating than flies buzzing around your kitchen and elsewhere in your home? I don’t think so, and doing even a cursory search on the subject will give you endless results on getting rid of them, trapping them, and repelling them.
Particularly, safe, DIY fly repellent is something that most homesteaders seem to care about based on how many people are searching for it.
One of the most commonly recommended pantry-ready repellents is vinegar, as it is said to drive flies away with great efficiency. But others say it does the opposite. So, does vinegar keep flies away?
No, vinegar does not keep flies away and instead actually attracts them. Vinegar is acetic acid, the same type of acid produced by decaying fruit and other vegetable matter. Flies are attracted to both and accordingly are attracted to vinegar.
I’ll tell you what, if you want to keep flies out of your home and out of your hair, using vinegar alone is definitely the wrong move! It’s basically a homing beacon that will call flies to the dinner table!
Vinegar is definitely a fly attractant, but it still has a part to play in fly eradication if you are smart. I’ll tell you why vinegar attracts flies, and how to use it intelligently in the battle against these annoying buggers below.
Isn’t the Acidity of Vinegar Harmful to Flies?
No, not overtly. That’s one thing you’ll commonly see reported concerning vinegar as a fly repellent: that it is so acidic, you know, how it stings your nose, but its vapors are actually harmful to flies and that’s why it will keep them away.
This is simply not true, as simple testing will reveal. If you care to leave out a dish or bowl of vinegar in your kitchen, and then crack a window or door, it won’t be any time before you notice flies showing up looking for the good stuff.
Of course, flies that fall into the vinegar might drown or be harmed by it, that’s true, but the vapor component itself is not harmful and not a repellent. Myth busted!
Vinegar Mimics the Odor of Spoiling Fruit
Vinegar is so attractive to flies because it is nothing more than acetic acid. Acetic acid is what is produced when fruit ferments, and that’s why those bad bananas and apples sitting in your fruit bowl have that tangy, offensive odor. They are basically producing vinegar as a byproduct of the decomposition process!
Flies naturally home in on acetic acid, particularly modest concentrations of it, which indicate that fruit is probably perfectly ripe and ready for them to eat or lay their eggs in. Fruit that is not yet ripe emits very little acetic acid, while fruit that is potentially too far gone emits a lot.
Extensive testing by some smart people has shown that flies prefer fruit that is just right in terms of fermentation, and accordingly produces moderate levels of acetic acid.
So, essentially, if you put out a bowl of vinegar, you are doing nothing but setting out a decoy that mimics lots of fruit that will surely be appealing to flies of all kinds, but especially house flies and fruit flies.
It’s best not to do that unless you have a plan for killing them at the same time!
All Kinds of Flies are Attracted to Spoiled Food
More generally, all kinds of flies are attracted to spoiling, rotting meat and bad smells generally. You know how flies tend to flock to dung piles, garbage, rotting grass clippings, and more? It’s the same thing here.
Basically, if it smells bad, flies are here for it, and vinegar doesn’t really smell good, as we’ve discussed.
Even flies that rely on blood as food or are necessary for producing eggs, like deer flies and horse flies, will still seek out decomposing biomatter, i.e., stinky stuff, to lay their eggs.
The larval form of flies, maggots, needs lots of decomposing organic material for food throughout their development cycle.
This means that using vinegar, which is extremely pungent, could draw in a lot more flies, and worse kinds, than you’re used to dealing with!
What About Homemade Fly Traps Made with Vinegar?
Now, I’ve been trashing vinegar as a component in your fly defense plan this entire time, but that’s only when it is used as a repellent. Because it isn’t!
Vinegar (particularly the distilled white one) actually makes great bait for all of the same reasons we’ve discussed, so if you know flies are in the area and you’d rather catch them and kill them, vinegar works like a charm.
One of the easiest ways to use vinegar for this purpose is by putting a few inches in a bowl or dish, adding a few drops of dish soap, stirring it briskly, and then letting the bubbles settle before covering it with plastic wrap.
Use a toothpick or skewer to poke holes just a bit bigger than the flies you’re trying to catch in the plastic wrap covering, and then set it out.
Flies will be inexorably drawn to the mixture, will crawl in through the holes to get it, and then be unable to find their way out. Eventually, they’ll get tired or slip and then drop into the liquid.
The soap will break the surface tension of the vinegar, meaning the flies won’t be able to use their wings and fly out. Then they drown!
This is a kid- and pet-safe solution that you can put together instantly in your own kitchen with things you already have on hand, and is one of my very favorite DIY fly traps. See? It’s just a matter of using vinegar in the right way!
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Tom has lived and worked on farms and homesteads from the Carolinas to Kentucky and beyond. He is passionate about helping people prepare for tough times by embracing lifestyles of self-sufficiency.