Shoo Fly Don't Bother Me

Summers often bring with them a deluge of flies and this can be an aggravation for those who enjoy dining al fresco.

If your garden is generally clean and tidy, and you manage your compost heap properly by aerating, and using the right mixture of organic material in it, and you still struggle with flies you may need to try something else. For extra help with your fly problem that's gentler than chemical treatments, try planting a good number of herb plants, or citronella in your garden. It’s also easy to make homemade traps with something sweet like sugar or honey, and a jar or a plastic bottle. 

Failing all of this this you can construct a Calliphoridae vomitorium to ensure that flies can exit your garden as quickly as possible. Unfortunately, this only works on flies that wear togas and enjoy terrible jokes. 

More seriously, on the positive side, flies can be great pollinators especially of some of the fouler smelling plants in a garden. Blowflies have even been used to help with pollination in the production of food crops in some places. Though we wouldn’t recommend creating the conditions in a domestic garden to reap the full benefits of fly pollination. That would be a tad horrifying. 

And that’s our minute for today, come back for a minute on Aphids, that formidable enemy of gardeners.