Fruit Flies Are Invading Birmingham Alabama Homes!

Travis McGowin Did you survive the holidays? Michael Wienecke I did. I did Travis McGowin unscathed. No issues, no, no pests, no family issues. You had a good Thanksgiving? Michael Wienecke No, a lot. You know, we wouldn’t be on this podcast. We weren’t talking about some kind of pest. Kind of pest issue. And yeah, unfortunately, at my home, I had a pest issue that popped up the day before Thanksgiving, and it wasn’t fun. So we had fruit flies all throughout the house. And so that’s what we’re going to talk about today, because as on as we’ve always talked about on this podcast, we talk about things that we see at customers house, at customers houses, and just so happens that I’m the the one that has them. Well, thank Travis McGowin you for being the guinea pig for today’s episode, but realistically so we just got through with thanksgiving. We’re diving straight off into the Christmas season. If your family is like mine. More specifically, if your spouse is like mine, you’ve had Christmas up since before Thanksgiving. Uh, so you’re knee deep in the holidays. And of course, along with that, brings the inevitable family get togethers where you know you may have a family get together that’s two weeks before two weeks after the holiday. Uh, everyone’s got a lot going on. And it’s so easy to go to the store buy the food that you need to cook fruits, vegetables, everything in between, and then forget about it and let it sit. And then Michael tell us what happens. Well, Michael Wienecke it’s funny because, you know, searching around the whole house trying to figure out what it is. Because, you know, obviously Travis, obviously Travis we’ve seen, I can’t even count how many fruit fly issues we’ve had or seen at customers houses. Jim searching around the kitchen trying to find where this issue is. I know it’s either something rotted or, you know, something that’s been out, like you said, overnight, or something like that. Well, between two stacks of paper was a banana, and it was very black, very, very black. So that was, that was the source. Got that removed, cleaned up, and, you know, and we’ll talk more about it, but we went into the treatment phase and got it pretty much eliminated that day, right before, I think, dinner time with my family for Thanksgiving. So it worked out pretty Travis McGowin well, right? And you know, some fruits, some vegetables, last longer than others based upon their storage, whether they’re on the counter, whether they’re in a cool, dark place, like maybe the bottom of a pantry, but inevitably, like I said, at some point you’re either going to forget that it’s there, you’re going to use what you need and put it back, and then, you know, it just sits too long, and it starts to, you know, maybe get a little too ripe, or even ferment or rot or something like that. And then somehow or another, they always find it, like they always the fruit flies will always find it. And then that’s when your problem starts. They start to colonize in that fermenting, decaying fruit or vegetables, or whatever it is you’ve left out that’s starting to get really gross. Michael Wienecke Well, and I hate to say this, but I blame the grocery stores, obviously, because you’ve got, you know, massive, massive amounts of vegetables and fruits. And where do they come from? Travis, where do these flies come from? So how do they get on these fruits? They Travis McGowin fly not out of thin air. They don’t just show up in your house out of thin air, that’s for sure. So they probably really fall into that category, very similar to a lot of other pests that are invited pests, because they don’t just occur naturally in your house. They’re usually brought in. So you know, if you had bananas sitting there on a shelf at a grocery store with just a huge stack of bananas, and the stock didn’t get rotated properly. And there’s definitely a chance that you could end up with some larva or something like that on what you bring home, and it wouldn’t be an issue normally, until you don’t actually finish the food before it gets too ripe or starts to, you know, spoil, Michael Wienecke right? I mean, you know, it’s coming from the grocery store, it’s already there in the food and it’s just sitting there, and as it ferments, it’s going to start, start popping into a big issue. So, and the the easiest way to control it is just getting it in time, kind of like I did remove that banana, you know, took it outside, threw it in the trash can. I have, I’m able to do a treatment, obviously. So I phoned all my drains, I did, you know, sanitization, to get rid of that problem. But really, just removing that banana, over time, the adults would have died, right? Travis McGowin But let’s be clear just how fast it can actually spiral out of control. Oh, yeah, you know, from start to finish, and we’ll do the breakdown of of what happens over the course of this...