Fruit Fly.

Drosophila Melanogaster.

Vinegar Fly.

i hate them.

i was gone from home for 48 hours this weekend, Tim’s greeting as i entered the back door…“This place is swarming with Fruit Flies.” He was diligent in searching for the cause and found an apple core in a living room waste basket incubating the disgusting pests. We have talked at length about where food waste should be thrown, it is not in the living room waste baskets, but that is just how it goes around here.

So the whole point here is twofold besides the fact that misery loves company and i am the queen of loving companionship in my misery, which actually makes three points.

Point 1…if you hate Fruit Flies as much as i do you need to know that you can trap a passel of them with a simple mix of apple cider vinegar and a few drops of any liquid dishwashing detergent.

Pour a quarter cup of apple cider vinegar in any container, drizzle in a bit of dish soap and set this in the area of your infestation. By the next morning  you will have a disgusting collection of dead fruit flies. It may take a couple of days to eliminate all that have made your house their home, but they will come and they will die. 

Unless of course you have California Fruit Flies….

It is so strange….Melissa has tried this many times. The last time Blessing and i were visiting, i used the exact same process that i use here at home….fruit flies completely ignore the vinegar traps in Los Angeles. I assume this is all due to some odd unknown species difference, they sure look and act like the midwest fruit flies i love to hate.

Besides being fascinated by this i have learned something from the behavior of the highbred California pest which brings me to point number two.

The vinegar trap process always, without fail, without exception works for me. As i have shared the fruit fly fix with Melissa it has not worked for her. In these differing results it would be easy for me to assume Melissa is doing it wrong, Melissa could assume i am not sharing accurately. Melissa may say, accurately… “it does not work! Dumb idea!” I might say…”it always works, you must be doing something incorrectly.”

I ponder, how much of my frustration in relationships might be as simple as this kind of misunderstanding.

How often do i know i am right and need to be right, while you know you are right and you can prove you are right, and if i am right, you must be wrong so we bicker and banter and hurt each other never coming to an understanding. It’s tough to come to an understanding when there is actually nothing to agree on. Sometimes what we are so very certain of just isn’t accurate from another’s perspective.

The next time i know what i know and i know that you are not getting it right, i pray i pause long enough to remember that not all vinegar flies are attracted to vinegar and the solution that always without fail works may not work for you in your area of need.

Just because something worked wonderfully in 1984 doesn’t make it the perfect solution for 2015.

What is a sure bet in Wisconsin may not work at all in California and no one will know why the difference exists.

Sometimes it is just the way it is, there is always another side to the story, another perspective to consider, there may be no route to agreement or understanding the situation.  It is for me to accept and trust, to believe the best and to give grace abundantly where differences are threatening to divide.

Additional Fruit Fly Trap Tips=Click Here.