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Home Sanitation and Hygiene: Flies

Elimination of Flies. - A link between the subject of home sanitation and hygiene and that of the prevention of disease has been forged by the discovery that the deadly germs of enteric diseases, such as typhoid fever, cholera, cholera infantum and tropical dysentery-are frequently communicated to man by the common house fly. Other diseases which are less commonly transmitted by flies are tuberculosis, anthrax, bubonic plague (black death), trachoma, septicemia, erysipelas, leprosy, yaws, and, perhaps, smallpox. The problem of eliminating the house fly belongs to the subject of sanitation because flies commonly become infected with noxious bacteria from reeding upon infected garbage or CONSUMPTIVE'S SPITTOON من TUBERCULOSIS TYPHOID ETC.

The agency of flies in communicating disease. Courtesy of the State Board of Health of Florida. other domestic refuse or the excreta of persons suffering from typhoid or other communicable disease, or those of healthy carriers. The elimination of these nuisances by the various methods of disposal above recommended is half the battle in the prevention of disease. Flies infest and HOME SANITATION AND HYGIENE feed upon decaying organic matter of all sorts, such as accumulations of swill in the vicinity of pig pens, garbage and animal excreta. If these substances are exposed in the vicinity of dwellings they will become infested with flies in such enormous numbers that it will be practically impossible to keep them out of the house, or to avoid their coming into contact with human food.

The following catechism, which is being distributed in great numbers by boards of health in many cities throughout the world, is a digest of scientific opinion on this subject.

Where is the fly born? In manure and filth.

Where does the fly live? In every kind of filth.

Is anything too filthy for the fly to eat? No.

Where does he go when he leaves the vault and the manure pile and the spittoon? Into the kitchen and dining room.

What does he do there? He walks on the bread, fruit and vegetables; he sticks in the butter; he swims in the milk.

Does the fly visit the patient sick with consumption, typhoid fever and cholera infantum? He does and may call on you next.

Is the fly dangerous? He is man's worst pest, and more dangerous than wild beasts.

What diseases does the fly carry?

He carries typhoid fever, tuberculosis and summer complaint. How? On his wings and hairy feet. What is his correct name? Typhoid fly.

Did he ever kill anyone? He killed more American soldiers in the Spanish-American war than the bullets of the Spaniards.

Where are the greatest number of cases of typhoid fever, consumption, and summer complaint? Where there are the most flies.

Where are the most flies? Where there is the most filth.

Why should we kill the fly? Because he may kill us.

How shall we kill the fly? Destroy all the filth about the house and yard; pour lime into the vault and on the manure; kill the fly with a wire screen paddle or sticky paper or kerosene oil.

Kill the fly in any way, but kill the fly.

Extirpation of Flies. -A very great deal of attention has been drawn to this subject by recent scientific investigations and many practicable suggestions have been made since the publication of the first edition of this volume. The control of the house Simple and very successful fly trap for a garbage can. Cloth curtain turned up to show cleats. It catches the flies outside the house. Flies enter the garbage can through the crack between the cover and the can, and also around the edge of the trap placed over a two or three inch hole in the can. After feeding they fly toward the light and come out this hole in the cover into the trap. (C. F. Hodge.) fly is now regarded as one of the most important of all sanitary problems. A nation-wide campaign to this end has been set on foot. It has been shown by actual experience during the last few years that the method of excluding flies from horse manure as elsewhere recommended, will greatly lessen the number observed in the locality. Several cities have adopted ordinances providing that the floors of stables shall be solid and free from cracks, and that horse manure shall be collected in tight cans or barrels, covered so as to exclude flies, and removed daily beyond the city limits. Some such means of depriving flies of their natural breeding places is the most essential step in the warfare against these pests. Any householder may greatly abate this nuisance by proper sanitary precautions on his own premises. And such means will be found very effective in localities where dwellings are fairly distant from one another. But since flies may come from considerable distances and bring with them infection from sources beyond one's control, it will still be found necessary to adopt preventive measures. In addition to those elsewhere recommended several ingenious methods of trapping flies in large numbers have recently been devised and may here be recommended. - Trapping Flies. Prof. C. F.

Hodge offers a number of practical suggestions derived from experience in catching flies in large quantities to feed bob-white and partridge chicks. His method is, in substance, to provide a number of large traps and either to bait them artificially with garbage and meat scraps in considerable quantities or set them at the flies' natural feeding grounds.

The working principle of these traps is that a fly seeks its food entirely by smell and will crawl to it through any dark crack. Thence, after feeding, it will fly or crawl toward the light. Hence, if a suitable trap is placed over the garbage can or swill barrel, or in a room or shed in homes, hotels, restaurants or markets, in which waste matter is collected, the great bulk of the flies which are drawn to these feeding grounds from the entire locality can be captured and disposed of.

Small traps of wire net can be bought for about 10 cents apiece in most localities. Or they can be readily made at home of two pieces of ordinary wire netting. The outer may be of any shape and size desired. The inner is merely an inverted cone with an opening just large enough to permit the flies to crawl in. One or more of these traps may be attached to the lid of the garbage pail, swill barrel, or hog trough over a hole through which the flies may find their way into the trap after feeding. Lift the lid or cover of the receptacle a little way to admit the flies and hang something over the edge so as to keep out the light. Or a strip of burlap from an old potato sack may be thrown over the lid to keep the sun out.

Box fly trap designed by C. F. Hodge.

Or if there is no accumulation of garbage, swill or other natural feeding ground for flies in the locality, construct one or more large traps in the form of a screened box, as shown in the illustration. Artificially bait these by placing, in old tomato cans or other receptacles, meat scraps and similar refuse beneath the platform on which the traps are located. Bring the side boards below this platform nearly to the ground so that the space beneath, where the bait is placed, may be dark. The cones in the illustration may be readily made from pieces of ordinary wire netting.

One small boy in Worcester, Mass., has a record of capturing about three bushels of flies in a trap of this kind during a single summer.

If the small woven wire traps are HOME SANITATION AND HYGIENE used, the flies may be killed by immersing them in boiling water. Or hold the traps over the flames of burning newspaper. Or if the large screen boxes are employed, equip them with one or more small vessels containing liquid fly poison. A good fly killer consists of a teaspoonful of 40 per cent solution of formaldehyde and one-half teaspoonful of sugar dissolved in a cup of water. This may be exposed inside the fly trap in a shallow vessel, as an earthenware plate or pie tin, and also in saucers or other suitable receptacles, in any part of the house. While deadly to flies it is nonpoisonous, in small quantities, to children or domestic animals.

Or dissolve 1 dram of bichromate of potash in 2 ounces of water, add a little sugar and expose in shallow receptacles. These poisons are quickly effective in fly traps because the flies cannot get to any other source of water supply.

Or fill a half pint or a pint bottle having a nick in the top of it with the poison mixture. Quickly invert this in a small shallow dish. Support the bottle in that position upon a bracket and hang it up where the flies abound. A nick of the right depth in the mouth of the bottle will keep in the dish a shallow pool of poison all the time.

Or to make an efficient, cheap and safe fly poison, for use in the household, markets, store windows, etc., mix 1 cupful milk, 1 cupful water, 1 teaspoonful 40 per cent solution of formaldehyde, 1 tablespoonful sugar.

Pour enough of this solution over a small slice of bread placed on a saucer to thoroughly saturate it and leave surplus liquid in the saucer.

Place these saucers on window sills and other places where flies swarm, but out of reach of children and animals.

Another ingenious method suggested by Prof. Hodge is to attach a small wire trap to the wire screen with which windows and doors are protected against insects in summer.

Two small guide boards tacked on the screen lead the flies to a small opening near the top and thence through a hole in the screen into the trap. A similar trap may be attached to the inside of the same or another window and thus flies may be Device for poisoning flies. caught both "coming and going."

This method is equally well adapted to the house and to the barn and stable.

A little ingenuity and reasonable pains in providing and caring for a sufficient number of traps of this character will, according to Prof.

Hodge, reduce the number of flies in most localities to a point such that the few that do finally get into the house may be readily killed with the ordinary fly swatter. The importance of the campaign against flies from the standpoint of sanitation and the prevention of disease can hardly be overestimated.