Lure-Fly Sticky Strips

Details

There is nothing clever about a sticky strip and that is exactly the appeal. You hang it, flies land on it, they stay. No active ingredient, no resistance, nothing to keep out of feed, and nothing that stops working because you used it last year. In a milkhouse, a tack room, a shop, or over a doorway where you would rather not spray, a strip is often the right answer. Placement is what separates a strip that fills up from one that catches four flies all summer. Flies gather where it is warm, bright and out of the wind, and they rest on vertical surfaces and hang around ceilings and near windows. Hang strips high, in sunlit spots, near where flies actually congregate rather than where it is convenient for you, and use several — a single strip in a large space is decoration. Replace them once they are covered; a full strip catches nothing. They are best understood as one part of fly control rather than the whole thing. Flies breed in wet manure, spilled feed, and damp bedding, and no trap of any kind out-competes a good breeding site. Cleaning up the source is what actually lowers numbers; strips catch what is already flying. Two practical notes. The adhesive is extremely difficult to get off hair, hands and clothing, so hang them where livestock, pets and people will not walk into them, and be careful of birds and bats in barn spaces. And unroll them outdoors or over a floor you do not mind — the first thirty seconds are always the messiest part.