What’s that buzzing? Either you have a faulty wire somewhere, or you have one of the most common pests in Saratoga County: flies.
Flies are certainly nuisances, and their presence in your home can make it hard to relax or enjoy time with your family. All that buzzing gets tiresome, and flies can manage to evade the swatter no matter how many times you use it. However, flies are more than just annoying – they can also be dangerous to your New York household. Let’s delve into identifying these winged nuisances and what you can do to prevent them.
blow fly landing on a house plant
Fly Identification Tips
There are two common fly species in Saratoga County: blowflies and houseflies. Both fly species have stout, rounded bodies, large red eyes, six legs, and thin, clear wings.
On top of these characteristics, houseflies grow to around 7-8 mm in length. Their wings grow to about double their body lengths, and their bodies are brown to black in color. Blowflies, by contrast, grow anywhere between 8-10 mm and have wings that only grow to the length of their bodies. Blowflies are most recognizable by their metallic blue-green color.
These pests are likely to invade your home because it has food sources. Flies will feed on food, waste, and even dead organisms, often laying eggs in the process. Flies can smell food up to a mile away, so if you see them flying about the house, they’ve already found a food source.
Why Flies Are Dangerous
You’ve probably seen a cartoon character attacking a fly with a swatter, and as a result, the cartoon character breaks everything in the house. While this is a potential danger for flies, there’s a much more common danger they pose to Saratoga households: disease.
Since flies will feed on almost anything, they can pick up certain diseases by feasting on waste or dead organisms. Some of these pathogens remain on the surface of the fly’s feet or in their saliva; when the fly crawls around your house or gets into your foods, those same diseases start multiplying.
Both houseflies and blowflies can vector a number of dangerous pathogens, including dysentery, anthrax, typhoid, cholera, tuberculosis, and salmonella. These diseases can affect you, your kids, and even your pets. Simply put, flies are bad news around the house.
Effective Fly Prevention Tips
Residents of Saratoga County would do best to prevent flies from getting into the house. The moment you see flies, you’ll want to disinfect everything. Save yourself an additional cleaning day by implementing the following precautions.
- Remove access to food and waste. Keep trash bins inside the garage. Make sure your pantry doors are secure. And make sure any organic materials are properly stored.
- Clean tight spaces, like the cracks under appliances or the backs of closets. Flies will feed on other dead insects, which you’re likely to find in tight-knit spaces.
- Close up any cracks around the house, including window caulking, door frames, sealants, and any crevices in chimneys or crawl spaces.
- Install fly screens for windows and doors. Though this isn’t the only thing you should do to keep flies out, it could be an effective last step in your home fly defense.
Even with these prevention plans in place, flies are hungry and persistent, and sometimes they find their way in anyway. If you’re still fending off a fly infestation, reach out to the pest control professionals at Old School Pest Control for total housefly and blowfly maintenance.