Combating flies in an outdoor kitchen/patio

[jfmorris]

I've had more flies make it through the back door and into the house this year than I can ever remember. I'll be laying in bed and see a fly go by at least once a week, and its at the far end of the house from any outside doors. I've not had much issue with them outside though. It may help that most of the time outdoors when grilling is in a location with two ceiling fans in a pavilion by the pool, and I run the fans on full blast. We've also been using a couple of Thermacell devices around the pool when outside, to keep mosquitos away. Maybe it helps with flys too?

I had a lot of mosquitos early in the summer, before getting the Thermacell's, and I also spent time spraying the yard and foliage I could reach with this garlic based stuff called Mosquito Barrier (mosquitobarrier.com), and feel that it certainly helped with mosquitos. Maybe it helped with flies too?

Even before we had the pavilion with 2 ceiling fans, I would put an oscillating fan or two out in the sitting area by the pool. I had two of those with a tall stand on them. I think a breeze, even if its from a fan, helps keep insects away.

[Donw]

Just to reiterate what others have said, place them well away from where you will be. 50-100 feet away, heck 200 feet, will draw them away from where you are. They can smell that stuff from a mile away and will make a beeline to it and leave you alone. In my particular case I change them every week because where I live they are overflowing at 2 weeks, but you don’t need to. Just keep an eye on it, and when it is nearing being full, hang another bag and give that one some time to ripen before removing the first.

[Panhead John]

Good point in the change out routine!

[DogFaced PonySoldier]

We've moved our 2 bags out to the back fence and it seems to be helping a bit more on the patio. I will say, after 1 week, they NEEDED to be changed. They were both full FULL and one of them had live maggots crawling around inside it.

So I bought like 4 more from Lowe's put 2 up, and we can see from the patio to the fence they've got a pretty good number in them already 1 day later. I'm sure we're attracting them from all over the neighborhood - while we are picking up our dog's p00 and trying to keep things down, I know others in the neighborhood probably don't.

[Donw]

They make a “Big Bag,” trap which costs about 2 dollars more, but gives you another 4” of depth in the bag to hold more flies. Might be worth it to see how long it takes to fill up.

[DogFaced PonySoldier]

They make a “Big Bag,” trap which costs about 2 dollars more, but gives you another 4” of depth in the bag to hold more flies. Might be worth it to see how long it takes to fill up.

[xaugievike]

https://www.bugasalt.com/pages/shop-collections#shreder

Infinitely more fun than the standard version

[ItsAllGoneToTheDogs]

Ever since the sheriffs office built a stable about 1/4 mile from our house a few years ago, I have been unable to win this battle... Winter is my favorite BBQ time of the year because of it. Having said that, hanging fly traps at the corners of my yard filled with star bar has helped some. I have almost 1/2 acre fenced in though. The things do smell... post them AWAY from your cooking area, you don't want to attract them to your cooking area

[latenight71]

I went to a party on Saturday and the host had some of these Shoo-Away fans on the food table.

https://shooaway.com/

it seemed to do the trick though the flies weren't too bad without it. maybe more of a party gift. i like the stink bags for attracting flies but they stink like crap and sometimes that's worse than the flies.

This is a similar take on the stink bags but you provide the bait so you can make it less stinky if you want. I've read that beer works rather well. Probably PBR would work best.

https://flytrapofficial.com/