Compost & Fruit Flies

I started composting 5 years ago, and every spring since then fruit flies have managed to find their way to my kitchen.  They irritate me the fire out of me.  I keep my kitchen clean (okay fine, as clean as I can with 3 kids adding to the messes as fast as I can deal with them), I carry the fruit and veggie scraps to the compost bin daily, I add more "brown" to the pile outside, etc.  It doesn't matter.  The fruit flies never totally go away.  

A few weeks ago, I saw an advertisement in my Gardener's Supply Company magazine for a $20 fruit fly trap.  The colorful pear shape is definitely an attractive solution to a nasty problem, but I'd rather spend that money on seeds, plants or tools.  So I poked around online and spent 2 minutes throwing together a trap that has worked amazingly well.  And didn't cost me a dime.

I used an old sparkling grape juice bottle, some apple cider vinegar, and a small paper funnel held together with one little piece of tape.  The funnel being small was key for me.  I jammed it into the bottle securely enough that it didn't require a seal of any kind.  My original funnel was made from an uncut 8x13 piece of paper, and it was apparently too tall for fruit flies to bother exploring.  I cut the funnel down to about 3 inches and started catching flies immediately.  It's been sitting innocently beside my sink for weeks now, has no odors like I was afraid it might, and is the ONLY place I find fruit flies in my entire house.