Fly Control Product Review-Black Flag Window Trap

We live on a farm with livestock nearby. Most years, flies can be somewhat controlled at the source, in the pen area. This year, in the absence of a real winter, the flies have been nightmare-ish.

While I do make use of fly-trap jars that are attractant based, we were getting them inside at a level I found unacceptable. We finally gave in, and went with pesticide outside the house, but inside I decided to give the new Black Flag Window Traps a try. I am not being paid or compensated in any way by the manufacturer for this review. We purchased our traps at Menards at $2.00 for a packet of four.

Essentially, it is a clear, plastic rectangle of sticky tape that you affix to the corner of a window. Flies tend to land, and gravitate upward...until they get to the corner. Unlike the fly tape that spools as a ribbon, this leaves very little room for escape. Sooner or later, the flies attracted to the brightness of the window track to that corner. While your idea of family fun might not involve counting how many flies your trap catches each day, we've been pretty delighted with the results. The pesticide has slowed the initial spring onslaught, and hopefully got the next generation before they hatched, but the flies that were still puttering about are quickly being taken care of by the traps. I should note that the volume of flies we are seeing would be extraordinary even for the height of summer, but whatever the cause, we've been able to deal with the indoor problem without resorting to heavy chemical use by employing a number of these traps throughout the house. I can live with just about anything, but flies really put me over the edge. We typically get one cold day in the fall when all the flies freak out, and try to get inside, then they die. This year, we had them straight through winter, more or less, and then about a month ago the population just exploded. It isn't just us-the house 3/4 of a mile from us is suffering too-and they aren't near livestock. Even in town they're finding themselves inundated this year.

I wouldn't recommend a product if I didn't use it, and certainly not if it didn't work well. These traps work incredibly well, are fast, affordable, and chemical free. Just get someone else to peel the filled sticky tape off the window for you-it can get kind of gross.