For the past couple of weeks, I have been bothered by these little red/brown gnats/flies in my house. Tonight was the worst...I've probably killed 50 of them since I got home at 6. I've seen them in various places around my house, but they tend to swarm in the kitchen. They don't swarm on food, though (I put out a saucer of honey to catch them, and it didn't work). They swarm on my kitchen faucet, and in/around the sink. I keep my kitchen clean, and the only food on the counter are a few pieces of fruit (and I never find the flies on the fruit). I've tried cleaning the sink and the drain, to no avail. I can't figure out where they are coming from, either. Any advice on what they are and how to get rid of them?

Apple Cider Vinegar w/ a squirt of dish soap will take care of them

This may be a stupid question, but do I put the vinegar and soap in a dish and just wait for them to land in it? Or do I clean my sink/counters with the mixture?

in a dish preferably under a light at night

Put on rubber gloves, make sure the garbage disposal is turned off, and hand wipe bleach up inside the garbage disposal rim in the sink. You have to get your hand up in there and coat it around. Old food particles stuck to the roof of the disposal tends to be a breeding ground for these things.

I can't stress enough... make sure the disposal is off.

Look like this? Mexican fruit fly

They have a real short incubation period so might require multiple treatments.

We have this problem as well. For about a month. We don't leave food out either and always wipe down the kitchen when we are done. I also have a foaming drain cleaner that I use, so I may have to try the bleach as another poster mentioned. On occaison, I have found one or two in the bathrooms. We don't have swarms but we seem to find a couple of them each week.

The ones that we seem to have were identified as red-eye gnats (also known as drain flies, fruit flies). They are not what is pictured above. The ones that are in our house have obvious red on their face.

I put a dish with apple cider vinegar then squirt dish soap on the top and swirl it around. I've read the soap prevents the gnats from flying out once they land in the mixture. We have also found that this mixture will attract flies as well. So if you ever get a pesky fly in the house, just leave out that mix and it will soon be gone.

Thanks for the replies! I'm not sure if that picture is what I have in my house or not. I put out some cider vinegar with a squirt of dish soap near the sink last night, and I left the kitchen light on, too. By the time we left the house this morning, there were 6 flies in the mixture. There were several more buzzing around the bowl, so I imagine they will fall in sometime today. The vinegar/soap mixture is much more efficient than me jumping around my kitchen and clapping my hands trying to kill the little buggers. I will try cleaning the drains, too.

I had the same problem last summer. I used a similar method, but sort of stumbled upon a method I think works a little better.

I skip the vinegar, but put out a couple of bowls of VERY sudsy, hot water, using Dawn Apple Blossom dish washing liquid. [The green kind!] I let the suds rise above the rim of the bowl and then place them under/near light sources. One goes on the stove with the vent light on and I leave one in the sink with that light on, too.

I don't know if they are attracted to the shiny bubbles or the heat... maybe the smell of the Dawn, I dunno, but I've caught 20 or more after leaving them overnight. After a day or so they were gone.

Not sure if you absolutely need that particular dishwashing liquid, but thats what I use and it works! I empty and refilled the bowls a few times each day until there were no more gnats.

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Old food particles stuck to the roof of the disposal tends to be a breeding ground for these things.

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The easiest way I've found to clean a disposal is to drop ice cubes into it, several at a time, while it's running. The ice shatters and acts kind of like a sandblaster to dislodge stuck on junk.

Have a little water running into the sink at the same time to keep things moving down the drain. Super easy, takes just a half a minute, and there are no chemicals or cleanup.

+1 for ice cubes in the disposal. If you don't run water it builds up like a (putrid) slushie and the amount of gunk can be vast. However, the ice scrapes all the gunk off the roof of the disposal and blades. Twice a week , no muss, no fuss

I've tried apple cider with a drop or two of Dawn soap - NO LUCK.
I've tried ammonia in the drains - NO LUCK
I've tried bug spray - NO LUCK
It is not a large infestation, but one to three gnats each day, in the tub, or on a wall near or in the bathrooms; or on a counter in the bathrooms. Nothing works.

If you can get a good pic of such a small thing, or even catch a few and we can meet up, a few of us bug folks might be able to help. Do you have any potted plants?

edit: for 1-3 gnats in the house... they're most likely sneaking in when you're going in & out the door. I wouldn't worry about this AT ALL.

[This message has been edited by rhoswen (edited 7/31/2013 4:54p).]

Definitely sounds like fruit flies and they love the drains. We pour bleach down all our drains (including bathroom tubs and sinks) when we have a problem and that works very well. I have also seen a Terro brand fruit fly trap (looks like an apple) at Lowe's but we haven't had to try that yet. Good luck!

I make gnat traps that look like these http://www.transformationswellness.net/growing/gnattrap.asp and put sugar plus apple cider vinegar in the bottom of the 2 liter bottle (just make sure you have enough room for the gnats to get in).

I use staples to hold the top part of the bottle to the bottom while I tape - make sure your tape does not have much of a smell, otherwise the gnats will stay away (found that out the hard way).

I've used these traps to get rid of gnats in 2 buildings on campus and I've heard that they also work on fruit flies.

I've had a really similar situation recently and I found something that looks like it's worked really well.

My roommate had a small mason jar that she just finished drinking strawberry juice out of. Instead of emptying out the little strawberry bits that were left behind, we left the fruit and filled it about a quarter way up with some old Don Simon Sangria and we added a couple drops of lavender scented dish soap. We put saran wrap over the top, closed the lid, and put a couple holes in the saran wrap.

In about a week we had dozens of dead gnats that sunk to the bottom. We hadn't seen any just floating, and we had only seen them after we picked up the jar and looked at it from the bottom. I emptied it out and then put one part vinegar and one part of the same wine with a couple drops of the same dish soap, and we are waiting to see how that works out.

Any kind of red wine should works, that's just the wine that we had on hand and it had already started to go bad.

Fruit flies, Drosophila, are pretty easy to catch.

Take a mason jar, put a very ripe banana in, cover with saran wrap and cut small slits with a sharp knife.

The flies will climb through the slits to get in, but will never get out.

Each trap can catch a couple hundred in a couple days.

Afterward, just throw the jars away.

Ok, I know this may be a super late reply, but THANK YOU for the help w these lil, tenacious vermin! We had these lil buggers (drosophila) out of nowhere, and they were EVERYWHERE They almost seemed to be aggressive, too, bc every time I'd come in, things would be quiet until I walked by the stove area (where they seemed to congregate)...then they'd be dive-bombing me left and right! Did everything: pulled out the stove and fridge, nothing. Lysol'd on and behind everything. Poured straight bleach down the drains (bathroom and kitchen)...still were there. Got those fly tape things, and put 4 around the place; kitchen, bathroom, bedroom. Oddly, nothing on any except the one at entrance to bedroom? I guess that's a popular thoroughfare for them

Anyway, tried a combo suggestion from here, and got 19 in one night!!! Each day it's been less and less, so hopefully we've made it past the life cycles of these pains in the you-know-what!

We used:

Tall juice glass
Filled w approximately 1" apple cider vinegar
A couple drops of Ivory dish soap
Mix
Made a cone w a sheet of paper, with a fairly tight opening at the tip of the cone (only had lined paper, so I made the cone with the lines on the inside)
***IMPORTANT*** Taped the cone closed, THEN, taped the cone to the glass. This must be done, bc the first day we saw like 6 of em in there right away, then an hour later there was 3. There weren't any gaps, so they must've pushed their lil nasty selves out. So, TAPE THE CONE TO THE GLASS, TOO.

Hope that helps someone else!! And hopefully we'll be rid of these p-i-t-a's soon