What is the best way to catch flies?

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Crazy4mantis

Crazy4mantis

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What is the best way to catch Houseflies from outside? The traps I've set haven't caught anything. What is the best bait? :poop: There are plenty around my house, but they never seem to be there when I need them. :mad:

 
I can tell what works the best. If you get a small plastic cup of at least four ounces, but preferably 8 oz. and place at least two ounces of fresh dung in it. It matters not the species, but all mammalian dung works well including human. Then it will take only a few minutes and houseflies to the largest Blow flies are going to be in the cup. The next thing is to get them in your grasp. The way I do it is I use a medium sized (at least 12" x 12" preferably a bit larger than that) piece of mesh cloth that you can easily see through. I cover my face with the cloth as I approach the cup. Moving slowly and making sure there are at least three to four up to twenty flies can be caught at one time. You must cover the cup loosely and very quickly without being detected till it is too late. Give the flies a small tent over the top of the cup in which they can escape the cup, but be captive to your mesh tent. Then carefully fold up the bottom ends to there is o way of escape. You can take this mesh tent full of flies directly to you enclosure, or place in a 32 oz. deli cup in put in the freezer to stun the flies. This way you can easily distribute over a few enclosure or feed by hand as needed. You can experiment how long it takes your freezer to stun the flies. My freezer, which is fairly new and efficient does not take more than two minutes to stun most flies. I hope this helps you. I have caught over eighty nice big blow flies in a day when I needed to do so.

Rich

 
Rich S said:
I can tell what works the best. If you get a small plastic cup of at least four ounces, but preferably 8 oz. and place at least two ounces of fresh dung in it. It matters not the species, but all mammalian dung works well including human. Then it will take only a few minutes and houseflies to the largest Blow flies are going to be in the cup. The next thing is to get them in your grasp. The way I do it is I use a medium sized (at least 12" x 12" preferably a bit larger than that) piece of mesh cloth that you can easily see through. I cover my face with the cloth as I approach the cup. Moving slowly and making sure there are at least three to four up to twenty flies can be caught at one time. You must cover the cup loosely and very quickly without being detected till it is too late. Give the flies a small tent over the top of the cup in which they can escape the cup, but be captive to your mesh tent. Then carefully fold up the bottom ends to there is o way of escape. You can take this mesh tent full of flies directly to you enclosure, or place in a 32 oz. deli cup in put in the freezer to stun the flies. This way you can easily distribute over a few enclosure or feed by hand as needed. You can experiment how long it takes your freezer to stun the flies. My freezer, which is fairly new and efficient does not take more than two minutes to stun most flies. I hope this helps you. I have caught over eighty nice big blow flies in a day when I needed to do so.

Rich
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very good idea

now where did my mom put those laxatives :tt2: :poop:

 
I also notice that they tend to land on my garden hose when it's stretched out in the sunlight. And at nighttime, find some weeds where they sleep. I sweep my net through the evening primrose at 7PM and catch 20+ flies at a time :)

 
Alex: If you are eating healthfully there is never a need for a laxative. I am sure you are just joking.

 
patrickfraser said:
No need for laxatives. A good enema will work every time.
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just thinkin abt it makes me wanna drop a load

maybe tomorrow when i scheiße, since it will be my birthday, my first poop as a 16 yr old will be lucky and attract infinite flies

if it does i can sell it to other forum members so they can do the same :shifty:

 
Wolfpuppy: That is a good idea. I find that flies need a source of warmth and also moisture so you have it there in your technique of sweeping the Primrose.

This is surely a cleaner, less smelly way to get flies. Have you noticed how some of the wild caught flies are absolutely enormous?

 
I go out at night in a bushy area, I use a High power LED flashlight (1000 lumens >=) but you don't need that hehe) and I hold a 32oz cup with the flashlight at the bottom outside of the cup. Usually within 1 min. I have 20 flies inside, then I cap the cup with lid while light is still on. Flies in 1 min. works good for me.

 
Yes - I love the giant flies. Something else interesting is that it seems they like to roost together. one primrose plant will have 15 and the one next to it won't have any... Interesting...

 
Wild caught flies are larger, because they have had time to grow and they are not hatched and put to death by mantis immediately. Flies do grow to be quite larger if given time and good food.......and I'm not talking sh!t, either. lol

 
Horse flies around here get very large, like .75 inches! But if they find you first you'll know it and be missing a piece of skin as well. Thanks to my 2 dogs :poop: one being a Mastiff I have no problem getting flies from outside using a cheap fish net, but most are green-bottles which are a bit smaller than the BB's I buy from Rebecca.

If your only feeding a few mantis wild caught are the way to go, some people don't know but flies are one of the best pollinators we have, in turn making them a good food choice for mantis.

 
I'd use a mashed banana and mix it with a bit of vingear and put it in a cup. You may mircoware it for 10 seconds. Then leave the cup in sun spot... the flies like being in hot spot.

You would give yourself a little effort by catching them in feeding on banana with a net. I once caught a huge fly that I had never seen before. It's double than blue bottle flies! I decided to let it go because it's too special to be eaten lol.

I sometimes use my cat's :poop: if I'm that lazy lol.

Or

:poop:

Your choice. lol.

 
Just put some fruit or rotting fruit in a shaded place outside in a bowl and comeback after a little bit of time and bring plastic cup with something to use as a lid like a flat piece of plastic. If there are a bunch of flies (there will almost certainly be) cup them with the cup and put the lid on and shake the the cup until they stop moving and put them in another container and do this over and over again. This takes a lot of time to catch many flies so it be better if you just buy pupae from mantisplace or somewhere else.

 

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