Fighting our gnat problem
Several people have reported gnats in their homes and businesses from around the area. It seems that once you have them you can’t get rid of them either. After all they love moisture, potting soil, fruit, and love to find a home under the sink. These pesky creatures live in your house plants and lay eggs in the potting soil, doing damage to those same house plants. If the annoyance of having them around wasn’t enough, they bite, and you might have thought it was a mosquito; nope!
According to experts, moisture and salt attract gnats, which unfortunately for you is found in sweat and tears. They also are attracted to bad breath and carbon dioxide that people breathe, which is why they fly around your face.
What’s interesting is only female’s bite. They do so because they require a “blood meal” for there to produce eggs, (Males feed on the plants). Gnats are active mostly during the day. Biting usually peaks during a three-week period in late spring, or early Summer. Gnats can live up to four weeks, but once you have them it seems impossible to get rid of them. Unfortunately, you must ask fast because they reproduce rapidly. A female gnat can produce up to 100-300 each time, up to 30 times before dying in 7-10 days.
If you are seeing a gnat problem the first thing to do is to eliminate the food source and eliminate its breeding ground. To do this first begin to store your fruits in the refrigerator for the time being or place them in a food-safe, sealed container. Second, AgriLife recommends that when you water plants allow the soil to dry out a little before watering them again.
If you, unfortunately, have them already, there are things that people commonly do to fight them. Some are more effective than others.
Buy the yellow sticky traps from the store. The glue-coated, adhesive paper attracts gnats with their bright color, then traps them when they land.
Many people use grandma’s jar of rotting fruit trick covered with perforated plastic wrap, with tiny slits, to lure and then trap gnats.
Some people swear by the vinegar-red wine traps. Like the grandma’s fruit trap, it uses the gnats’ attraction to the smell of the liquids to trap them inside a jar.
One popular method was recently featured in a KVUE article. “Apple cider vinegar: In a small bowl, mix a half cup of warm water plus two tablespoons of apple cider vinegar, a tablespoon of sugar, and about six drops of liquid dish soap. Gnats will be lured in by the sugary mixture, but once they dip in for a drink, the sticky dish soap will trap them. Simply place the bowl with the solution in the areas where you’ve noticed the most gnats, and wait” If all else fails call an exterminator. They are trained in how to fight these pesky pests.