baby flies in pen!

[Marissa & Louie]

I’m not sure what to do, I keep noticing flies (they look exactly like a normal housefly but not as large) flying around Louie’s litterbox. I change his box every 4-5 days, so I tried changing it more frequently and the flies will be there again the day after changing the box! I did some research on flies and rabbits and discovered fly strike (where maggots lay eggs on the rabbit), and checked his whole body to find nothing.  He lives in a puppy playpen when I’m at work/college/etc., and I cover it with a fitted sheet because he discovered he is now big enough to hop over (and then gets into trouble). I noticed the flies only started coming when I started covering his pen; when he was a baby his pen wasn’t covered and I didn’t have a fly problem unless I didn’t change the box for 6-7 days. This leads me to think its something to do with the air flow? Which doesn’t make much sense considering its a wire pen…

Not sure if I’m being a paranoid bunny mommy or if there’s some action I should be taking??

[MoxieMeadows]

The only reason you’d be noticing it now is maybe the flies are getting trapped in his pen because there is now a cover on it. Maybe try putting up a fly tape near his pen, but Not where he can reach it. You could even try and take a fly swatter to kill all the living flies you can see, and then scrubbing everything with vinegar (white or apple cider. Although I think white is “safer” to use on floors. I have untreated wood floors that are like 80-100 years old and it lightens them if I leave a lot on the floor) to clean everything and kill eggs…What litter do you use? Maybe switch to something cheaper like shredded paper+hay so you could change it everyday until the fly problem goes away. I usually only see a fly every now and then, it got really bad though until I started changing her pan every day and keeping things clean+sanitary.
Flies are dangerous though, because they carry diseases (not sure if there are any that can be spread to buns though) and can cause flystrike. Also they are gross because they land in poop and rotting food and then land on you or your food. Yuck!

[Eepster]

You are describing them as “not as large” as a normal house fly, does that mean 75% the size, 50%, 25%, less?

If they are very small, they are probably fruit flies. Fruit flies would be from a piece for fruit or sweet vegetable bunny hid somewhere and forgot about.

[MoxieMeadows]

The flies I get are about 1/2 the size of house flies. Not as small as fruit flies but not as big as house flies. I have no clue what they are.

[Marissa & Louie]

The flies I get are about the same thing as Moxie said. Bigger than fruit flies but smaller than a regular house fly. But in appearance they still look exactly the same as a regular house fly. Also Moxie, isn’t shredded paper dangerous to use because of the color dyes on the newspaper? I currently use Yesterday’s News (the “cat” one that everyone here uses) with hay.

[lorree]

I’m not sure how the flies are over there but here in Australia, in the summer, there’s just flies everywhere no matter what I do, they love the heat and look for any moisture they can find.
So all I can do is keep things clean, try to kill as many as I can using fly tape or these fly traps I have and it doesn’t matter whether the litters dirty or not, they are just always there.
Pretty much like u see Aussies on tv constantly brushing away flies from their faces. So annoying

I guess that’s all u can do is keep checking the bunny and keeping things hygienic.

Maybe it u have something like flyscreen material, u could cover up the whole pen so they can’t get in. But u have to make sure bunny isn’t eating it

[LBJ10]

Hmm, maybe people call the same flies different things? What I mean is, what one person calls a house fly, someone from another region might call it something else. Not sure. I always thought of house flies as the “mid-size” flies. There are flesh flies, which are bigger, and horse flies, which are even bigger. Fruit flies are the tiny ones. There are bottle flies, but they are about the size of house flies, maybe a little bigger. They are metallic blue or green though.

[Roberta]

Does this help ?

[Marissa & Louie]

Yes! They are definitely horn flies!

[MoxieMeadows]

LBJ— Maybe people do have different names for common things. Like here we have Fruit flies, House flies, Horse flies and Moose flies. And then random ones we just call “flies” (like the horn fly)

[LBJ10]

Different beetles are called “June bugs”, depending on what region you’re in. Anything is possible.

[Author]

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