Hairspray: Easy Way to Kill Flies

Here's a handy household tip: hairspray can be used to catch and remove unwanted houseflies from your home. While they are sitting on a wall or other object, you can spray hairspray on them without triggering their flee response - probably just seems like a light, natural mist to them. But after they've been given a dose of the spray, their ability to fly is impaired, making them easy to catch. Just grab them with a piece of tissue, crush, and discard.

I had the idea last night while trying to catch a fly that was buzzing around a bathroom. I recalled that electrostatically charged microparticles of wax have been put in a non-toxic aerosol developed in England that causes flying insects to drop because the wax adheres to their wings. I figure hairspray could do something similar.

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