Banish fruit flies by placing two-ingredient solution near food

Fruit flies are one of the biggest annoyances associated with the kitchen, but we can keep the pesky bugs away using a simple hack that includes placing a two-ingredient solution near food.

The summer months are usually a time of optimism for Brits and this year in particular people have been treated to a scorching season. With all the positives that come at this time of year though, we have become all too familiar with the frustrating sight of fruit flies descending on our fruit during the warmer months.

While many homeowners have come up with their own quirky hacks and tips for keeping the pests away, YouTuber Jennifer, who runs Jennifer's Tips, has shared her own step by step trick to keep the problem under control. Using just two kitchen ingredients plus a couple of other household items, she manages to find the perfect solution for capturing the pests.

After finding an empty jam jar, she says that the next thing we should do is peel a ripe banana and break it up before adding it to the jar.

For the next step, you should find a piece of A4 paper and create a cone shape with it and place a piece of sticky tape near the base to securely hold it together.

Jennifer then recommends adding the next kitchen ingredient before placing the cone into the jar. She says to add apple cider vinegar, saying it is the "string smell" that "attracts the flies right away".

She says that we should then place the cone into the jar with the narrow tip pointing down making sure that it doesn't make contact with the banana peel and vinegar.

Explaining how the device works once it is all set up, Jennifer said: "In just a few hours, the flies go in (to the cone), but they can't come back out. The banana peel draws them in and the vinegar seals the deal. The paper funnel blocks their escape, no sprays, no chemicals, just a smart homemade trap that works."

To make sure the device works as it should do, she added that we should make sure that we're changing one element every day: "Change the banana peel every few days, and your home stays fly free."

While many consider fruit flies to be no more than an eye sore, they can also pose a serious health risk to humans, as Pest UK have explained: "They carry bacteria and transfer it to wherever they land.

"They're particularly attracted to ripe and rotting food, manure and other faeces that may contain salmonella, E.coli and listeria which cause food poisoning. Additionally, female fruit flies inject batches of eggs into ripe fruit, thus contaminating it."