Kiss those annoying fruit flies goodbye....

....if you can get your hands on one of the tiny elusive buggers, that is.

Q. -How do you know when a fruit fly farted?
A. - it flies in a straight line.

What I am about to show you is a very cheap, extremely effective, yet simple-stupid, do-it-yourself way, of removing these mini "bastiches" from your home once and for all. Any one who would call a professional to exterminate such a simple bug would have the exterminator laughing all the way to the bank. Yet there is no reason for you to suffer these jerks in your home. This is one extermination you can do easily by yourself.

At first most people think, they have "a" fruit fly and that they are seeing the same one over and over again (as if they had police, fruit fly, facial recognition technology installed in their brain). They all look alike! It's how they sneak up on you and take over your home.

Also another myth heard frequently is "oh, it's just a harmless little fruit fly". Yeah, harmless until they grow into a thundering cloud formation in the middle of your living room blocking your view of American Idol.

Fruit flies are just as dirty and nasty as their larger cousin, the house fly, and carry many of the same disgusting germs. In fact, fruit flies are more versatile than the ordinary housefly when it comes to thriving in your home. Fruit flies will feast, reproduce and poop in sink drains amazingly without drowning, a trick the house fly hasn't mastered. Fruit flies especially love potted house plants, anything or any place that has decaying or moist organic material will attract it. So do yourself a favor and keep a lid on your garbage cans, especially the kitchen can. Besides, "covering your can" ;) makes for positive feng shui in the home -- and garbage is just plain ugly to look at. Also if you have a cat, it will thank you if you remove any solid "land mines" from the kitty litter box on a daily basis and you will be depriving a mess of fruit flies a happy hunting ground.

One more word on prevention: Unless Better Homes and Gardens is gonna do a photo shoot in your home, there is no real reason to keep a bowl of fresh fruit out in the open. This is how you got the hitchhikers home in the first place. They no doubt traveled in with you on that ripe bunch of bananas. If you want an colorful table arrangement, buy flowers. Just ditch them before they begin to rot. Keep fresh fruit under cover or in the fridge. Eat it quickly or ditch it as soon it begins to over-ripen.

Okay, so here's my secret sauce: you no doubt have these items in your home already and if you did have to go out and buy any of all of the ingredients it should cost you no more than three Obama! inflated dollars. You will need a few cheap small plastic containers. It can be a plastic or styrofoam drinking cup or an re-used salad bar container, an old yogurt cup, you get the idea, just rinsed out the container. Next, apple cider vinegar, the low cost store brand will do, save your fancy organic vinegar for your salad dressing. Let me be clear here, do not use white (or clear) vinegar. Next, liquid dish soap, any bargain brand will work. You could use beer in place of the vinegar but most people I know don't love their fruit flies that much. Put about an inch or two of the vinegar in the container(s), add just a drop or two of the liquid soap. That's it, yer done. And so are the little pests, so wave bye-bye. You'll be amazed how many you'll catch with this simple recipe, especially the first set up. Then wash, rinse, repeat. Don't let the containers dry out or you'll be offering organic material for any remainder flies to feast on. For this same reason, flush the spent liquid down the toilet bowl, not down the sink drain.

The soap is the real secret. Fruit flies have the ability to hover over and land on water without falling in, much like mosquitoes can, but the soap makes the water slippery and they slip in and drown. You don't need any fancy store bought or specially designed funnel containers. Do it just like I tell you here. Fruit flies reproduce approximately every 14 days. You should notice that you don't notice them in about a month. In 60 days, they're history.

Now you can enjoy that special bottle of wine without these uninvited guests taking a slurp. And feel free to snore with your mouth full opened without fear of a midnight fruit snack or twelve getting sucked down your gullet.

Next up, an almost similar trick to control backyard mosquitos so you can enjoy that backyard barbeque.

Summer time and the living gets easy

Not only for us but for certain pests that get into our homes very easily because our guard is down, so we forget that millions of insects every where are also hatching, reproducing and enjoying the longer, warmer, weather. They simply pick up right where they left off in late autumn. And because we're not paying attention, we provide them with the good life.

One is the very common but nasty housefly. The other, is a seemingly innocent little moron that can hitch a ride home with you from the grocery store produce section... the annoying fruit fly (or drain fly)

These are two pests that you can get rid of by yourself. The first way is by preventative means. the second way is reactive and unless you're diligent, much harder.

One is to simply bring down and keep down your window screens to keep the houseflies out. Repair torn screens and make sure they are in their tracks. Because once these dirty little suckers get in... it's like having your own private trench coat wearing pervert, exposing itself everywhere you turn in your home. And this pervert carries it's own suitcase of germs and diseases.

Turn your back for a second on that dee-lish-us deli plate you were about to chow down on and you'll all of sudden find this "fly-guy" doing all sorts of unspeakables to your tender ham sandwich. And he just flew in your window from that steaming pile of dog poo just below your windows. Not to worry though, it was fresh poo.

So, unless you're into some serious girl watching from your high rise vantage point and insist on keeping those window screens open for a quick sneak peek at those bubbly Double D's walkin' by down below, you will have to take reactive measures by hanging those very ugly but very effective sticky fly tapes in appropriate spots around your apartment. Over open garbage cans or cat litter boxes, near open windows. Just make sure the tapes don't get stuck to your head while ogling the spring time lovelies.

As for the fruit flies -- I'll share with you a very cheap and effective method for eliminating those "all of a sudden" "everywhere at once" bugs as well. You'll love this tip especially if you have a ton of house plants.

stay tuned....

The Death Star (my website) is now fully operational..."

Say goodbye to New York Bedbugs.... they'll have to move out to Connecticut to be safe. I'd normally pick on New Jersey here but the "natural" chemical pollution there keeps them somewhat safe for now.

That road kill you see on Jersey Turnpike aren't all raccoons, ya know. What...  You've never seen a 20lb bedbug? Well, neither have I exactly, but if they did exist... it wouldn't surprise me to find them here in the Empire State.   The little jerks have been running amuck and have now been put on notice.

CONNEX has declared war.  And we have the ammo for the fight. Not just to kill "them" but also keep you and yours safe in the process.

More on that in future blogs...

Seems like it took an extremely long New York minute, but my web site is now up and not only looking good but it's also a well oiled machine. What that means to you (as my customer,) is a smooth as glass navigation website.

This new improved website will make it easier for you to find exactly what you need to know

quickly.   Whether it's just to pick up the phone and yell 

"HALP! Come save me!" 

or if you're looking for professional DYI info on the best way to do a thorough extermination job. This info section is a work in progress.... 

so stay tuned and check back often.