How a Farmer Won a War Against Flies
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- Опубліковано 10 тра 2024
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You could make a wooden attachment to your happy cowmobile that holds a panel for the fly paper near the top of it.
Edit: Someone also mentioned birds getting stuck on sticky traps, with an attachment/panel you can make it so birds cannot touch it with a wire mesh box design.
Can we get some 3XL love on the tshirts?
Noticed you acknowledged a few comments but I feel the same as some for more chickens & definitely donating the eggs, maybe the local hospital, churches, shelters, etc all love donations of all kinds, it is hard for me to see the plastic & trash you throw out, of course is bad for the environment also, is why the best is more chickens but seems you trade one bad issue with another on your farm, I agree the cow's comfort, health is priority.
Might be worth looking at the cost of making fridge magnets and pins/badges for the designs of your t-shirts once you have completed the run of t-shirt designs.Even ballcaps?
I can't afford one, but I'll like and always support u with me eye balls.😄
I moved onto a farm in the 1980s with flies: it was miserable; just miserable. In our 2nd or 3rd year, mom started keeping chickens free range in the yard; after a few months, we noticed almost no flies at all anymore; turns out the chickens were eating the fly larvae and breaking the fly cycle
I was thinking about that. It probably isn't wise to keep the chickens fenced out in a small area.
@@nahiyanalamgir7056 He moves the chickens and their fencing. We use the same technique and it works.
@@jimlongisland4863 Great!
@@nahiyanalamgir7056free range chickens involve losses frim predators. If you insist on free range at least use guinea hens.
Sounds much more economical than spending so much money on fly paper every day not to mention all the waste for just a tiny amount of cows
I have no cattle, don't live on a farm, don't even struggle with flies but I still watched your whole video and feel the need for fly paper in my life.
Same haha. This guy is cool
😂
Glad I'm not the only one in this situation.
+1 yea also need that
those fcking mosquito
@@KAZAMA231 exactly we will win the war together against the mosquitoes we will drink their blood now grab a straw and let’s feast😡
Oh my god - I never understood the sheer amount of effort & ingenuity necessary to farm without chemicals. I'm genuinely shocked. I see now why grass fed/organic food is expensive, but even then, I know they still use chemicals. What this guy is doing is so impressive to me & I love this farm so much. Going to share this video with my mom and my friends! Thanks!
❤
How does anyone farm without dihydrogen monoxide though? Isn't that the most important chemical for farming?
that was a yellow jacket not a honey bee :)
An insect is an insect
If its to the ground it’s annoying
If it flies its a threat and a target
@@Darkspark06 You dont even know why you should catch yellow jackets and not bees dont you?
yeah fr it was a good catch
Thats a2 protien, priceless….
A Wasp...
I am in Australia and I can tell you, the more a fly suffers the better.
The same applies to mice, rats, and politicians. 😊
@@jayjaynella4539 Don't forget roaches. Oh, you already said politicians.
@@mikle334 😂😁😂
And bogans!
@@user-ih7gc7dt9l You would require very sticky paper for them
A tip for your bait traps: Use vinegar, not soda. Flies are more attracted to smells more indicative of decay than they are smells indicative of sweets. That's why all the traps you said smelled bad smelled the way that they did. Also, Mythbusters tested it, and found that the old adage of "you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar" is not just false, but completely backwards.
Maybe throw in a chunk or two of cow patty too for additional odor.
Edit: and a small amount of environmentally friendly dish detergent might be a cheap, safe way to break surface tension and increase the kill rate.
I second that!
Oh you will catch flies with honey, just not the ones you want
in germany we use beer (or fruit juice) + vinegar + a few drops dishcleaner
less pain for the flies because they are drunk
Liquid cow poo will do it. Water + a fresh cow pie. use a stick to stir. Trap them with what they're used to eating.
From a veterinarian's perspective, you are doing an absolutely wonderful job! A lot of small farmers neglect the importance of looking after your cattle's health, and it speaks volumes of your efforts that you are willing to forfeit chemical treatments for the sake of your produce's quality and safety, keep up the good work!
Just saw this. My aunt has a cattle farm of about 1800 acres in southern Oklahoma. She uses these but almost industrial level. Has large canvas sheets covers them in rosin and nails the sheets to a plywood base. Once it’s full she takes the sheet off and puts it in her garage where she uses her old chicken heat lamps and scraps it off. New rosin is applied. Cycle over and over.
The sudden drop in flies is related to the lifespan/lifecycle. Black flies live 15 days or so. So if you've been catching flies for 2 weeks, it probably reduced the number of eggs being laid since you were catching the adults. That sudden drop in flies might have actually been that current generation of flies dying of old age, and too few larvae to replenish the population.
Nice!
his fly paper consumption would probably decrease aswell although im not sure how long the fly paper can be affective hopefully just a front heavy investment
The spreadsheet of pest control
Critical thinking on display !!!!
is this about flies or the modern west? 😉
I used to work in a fly lab, and we would set up traps with apple cider vinegar (flies are extremely attracted to fermenting drinks/foods) and a couple drops of dawn dish soap. The soap acts to break the surface tension so the flies immediately drown. I do this every time I get a fruit fly outbreak and it resolves within a couple days. Hope this works out for you!
This really works. One summer I went on vacation for a week and unfortunately forgot to take out the trash, when I came back home there was hundreds of blow flies everywhere and who knows how many fruit flies. Most of the larger flies were concentrated in the windows, so I got most of them with a vacuum cleaner. For the rest I set up a cup of apple cider vinegar and a couple drops of dish soap. I didn't really expect to catch the blow flies using this, just the fruit flies, but it attracted all of them.
Can yeast and soap work?
@@henoldpcllama if you put the yeast in juice then maybe.
Lol
Would this work inside a house to? Like in a Tupperware
>You died
>Gets reincarnated as a fly
>Spawned in this man's farm
your fault for spawning as a fly
I love the way you film the fact that you keep everything going. Everything is moving along and we are seeing the entire farm and your work and it is very relaxing and informative. Thank you
Humanitarian. Most farmers (particularly w/large #'s of animals) just never give flies a thought & think "oh well, that's just part of raising cows." Kudos to you...though your cows can't talk, I'm sure they are a lot happier 😊.
Such a person doesn't exist!
KILL ALL FLYS!
We don't bother to trap our flies because we would have to hunt down our cattle on miles of land just to put up a trap that they will leave the vicinity of tomorrow. Now I'm no cafo owner but that's my experience.
And less stressed.
What is on the flypaper that attracts them?
Breaking the fly cycle is the key. Once the adults are gone, be on the look out for another outbreak in about 8-10 days. Every cycle should get less and less. Also rainy weather makes flys worse. They are more likely to gather in one place where food is available when it rains. Chickens need to be moved directly behind the cattle to help. Flys lay eggs in the fresh cow pies. What you want is the chickens to pick those pies at the first signs of larva.
*flies
There is a saying that goes "A dead fly in April is a thousand dead flies, a dead fly in June is one dead fly"
I've had great results by working extra clean during the spring (cleaning out coops and stalls more than normally and spritzing everything with biological eucalyptus spray)
@@pepisipeps_yea dose the eucalyptus work in the house environment?
Can I make the spray with oil drops & water? Or do I have to buy it?
I get it from a poultry feed supplier in Germany and its specifically made for use IN the coop, nests, and ON the birds themselves (for mites) so if you get your hands on it might as well try it inside, I think it smells very nice too :) its called MiteFight but flies hate the smell too.
I dont have any experience with eucalyptus oil tho. But I think if you dont have any pets in your house you could give it a try.
Yes, move chicken tractor (s) behind the cattle. I've watched this for a long time. The chickens also add to the fertilizer for the pasture.
I appreciate your farming practices as a horticulture student! Thank you for setting great standards ❤️🔥 you’re doing amazing work out there❤️🔥❤️🔥 keep it up! Love the experimenting and dedication to keeping your animals safe and clean❤️🔥❤️🔥❤️🔥
It’s interesting to learn what some farmers are doing to combat flies, without resorting to “fly powder” or other chemicals. I am surprised just how effective the fly paper was for you. Thanks for sharing!
I would totally expect exactly what you saw with the sudden decrease. You started killing flies before they were laying eggs. That interrupted the whole cycle, but with the acceleration of killing flies AND not having more eggs to replenish them. At first you won't notice it, because the existing eggs were still hatching when you started.
Exactly this. You have to interrupt the life cycle. I’ve found it takes a few weeks as well and you have to keep it up too.
Ah. So the life cycle of most flies must be roughly 2 weeks
And flys don't travel far a day so easy to make a kill zone for flys
@@walterrwrush that’s a great point. I’ve heard a single trap can over time clear the flies in a 50 foot radius.
@@vengeful_pluto5586 Depends on the temperature. In warmer weather the fly life cycle goes faster (egg phase can vary from eight hours to twenty, larval stage can vary from days to weeks, etc.).
It makes sense that it took you 1-2 weeks to get rid of most of the flies. I imagine it was the time for all the larvae to mature and cycle through, while consistent enough to not give them enough time to reproduce.
@Ruff Kymberlee .
That's what I was thinking, there were still sequential waves of larva maturing and once he killed all adult waves it died off. You can see a similar kind of effect with population sizes per generation after world war 1 in Russia where they still have waves of very few babies every other decade because WW1 decimated the young adult Russian population.
Try leaving the traps in the poopy grazed zones until the fly larvae have hatched-breaking the cycle.
What an imbecile conclusions. Just research casualties rate in gender parts, then all women by the way had achild or two. So death of fertile male doesnt matter much
For your bucket traps, try beer, little water, tuna, and some broke eggs (shell and all). Also, try ranch fly traps. They are reusable and you can feed the Flys to your chickens. They love them!
the dude has really studied the art of sustainable farming my salutes and admiration to you. we need more like you in the world
I'm not a farming enthusiast or anything, just here to see flies die en masse. But man you're a delight. The world needs a lot more good dudes with wholesome dreams like this.
I didnt think I’d find someone who would say exactly what i was thinking damn near word for word but damnit sir you proved me wrong 🤝 i like the way you think sir
@@GodisGood941 I was thinking the same thing.
Wholeheartedly agree!
Took the words from my mind.
That wholesome dream means his steer will have cost him $50/lb by slaughter time. Without a gullible youtube audience giving him ad revenue, he'd be broke in a few months. How he "won a war against flies" was throw money at the problem which is not an option in the real world.
I knew a guy about 15-20 years ago that was dealing with so many mosquitoes on his property, that he wrapped his entire golf cart almost completely and fly paper or something of the sort that was really sticky, and he drove around the field outside of his house for like 3 hours. There wasn't a spot of that tape that wasn't covered in mosquitoes. He did this about every night for a week. I swear that mosquito population dipped down to about a quarter of what it was
easy mosquitoe fix remove all standing water ... thats right ... if it isnt flowing its gone ... that means you need water troughs that cycle the water ..... Mosquitoe larvae start in standing water so making sure that is gone stops them from breeding near your area
Mass genocide
@@freeeggs3811 kind of like how the white man slaughtered and occupied Native lands ... and NOT conquered OCCUPIED ... their lands
@@kaboom-zf2bl yeah that's cool and nifty, unless you live in any residential suburban area where you have no control over any of your neighbors yards. Mosquitoes travel for food they don't sit in a 5 ft radius. The more vegetation in the area, the more mosquitoes. You can't avoid it. You can only fight the mosquito gods and try and reduce it 😂
@@kaboom-zf2bl yeah
great video, nice that he took the time to explain the different things he was trying. Plus the rotation, not just the cattle but the chickens .
You can tell this farmer loves his animals.
Damn. My Grandpa's farm had about 200 cows and 70 horses. You can just imagine the amount of flies. I once used the roll when cows were returning from grazing back into the shed and in only about 20 minutes the fly paper was completely and utterly full, not a single spot left untouched. At that point I realized it's impossible but you went ahead and fought it and won! Amazing job.
70 horse 😳 that’s amazing
The trick is consistency.. Every fly you catch is a fly that isn't breeding the next generation.. May take a while, but you can eventually whittle the population down
You just have to keep the pressure on and keep killing flies.
I mean, hunters back in the old west thought that the buffaloes were too great in numbers for them to disappear and they just kept hunting them till they couldn't hunt no more.
It's all about interrupting the breeding cycle and bringing the reproduction rate below a threshold. For a bizarre modern example, look at China. They were micromanaging the population for so long, now they're in a population decline (I know, humans breed way slower than flies, but it's an interesting analogy on a macro level).
Man if i had that many animals I’d invest in a flock of cattle egrets and tree swallows! Or at least a bunch of birdhouses and bathouses.
When you were talking about not wanting to catch honey bees, the insect you showed on that gold stick sticky trap was a yellow jacket wasp, not a honey bee. Honey bees are usually only attracted to high levels of sugar, they'll even ignore most soft drinks. Hopefully your honey bees will remain safe!
Alot of honey (Chinese) is actually produced with sugar water instead of nectar.
That is the right identification of that insect, it is a yellow jacket but they also are pollinators. Not many people know they do that, they only think they are stinging pests but they are important to the environment as well. Unless their nests are in a place that they endanger humans you should leave them alone.
@@themonsterunderyourbed9408 why use bee vomit if you can use overpowered yellow sugar stuff -_-
Real honey = best honey.
@@gaoth88 I believe they meant they give the bees the sugar water instead of the nectar, and that still allows them to produce honey. So it still is bee vomit, though I agree it probably does not have much of a taste compared to real honey, considering taste is largely determined by what kinds of flowers the nectar was from when the bee consumed it.
@@Michelino_M5 not only does it taste different, it is counter productive for the local wildlife. Bees need to polinate the flowers. Honey is a by product for us. Also, I have seen bee keepers add stuff in the hive that, while not poison or anything, is far from propper honey.
Thanks for this. A good friend has a herd and they're covered but his view ( fifth generation rancher) nothing you can do about it. Great to see you can help .
Hi! Fly paper works great and can be less expensive than other traps, but when it did the work, you've to touch it to remove and replace, and, unless I missed anything in the vid, fly paper and its glue can pollute and must be disposed as waste. With yeast and baking soda, Fly Buster bait ingredients shown at 9:01, you can do by yourself effective bucket traps, bait and dead flies can also be thrown as fertilizer. If you use another smaller bucket with holes in the bottom, placed into the other one, you can throw away bug and reuse the bait...
yes reusable is always better. he's not buckets properly. The buckets have greater potential to be the best fly graveyards, if used effectively
I bet there was such a sudden drop because all the flies finally hatched. As soon as you started trapping them egg production mostly stopped, but it took a couple of weeks for all the existing eggs to hatch. Development from eggs to adults takes about 3 weeks.
If that's true, then the chickens were the real reason the population dropped. The existing flies would have eventually died.
@@morninglift1253I am not sure that's correct. The chickens certainly do not eliminate anything like *all* the eggs/larvae; they're restricted in the territory they can deal with, and being 2 days behind the cattle in terms of location in the rotation there would presumably be 66 days for the eggs/larvae they miss to hatch/develop . And obviously those hatched eggs become flies that can roam freely, so the fly population cannot be tranched like cows, chickens, and fly eggs/larvae.
In addition, the chickens never impact fly lineages which propogate outside their 3 week coverage. There are 3 such propogation periods in 66 days: at least 2 such periods would be entirely unculled by chickens.
I believe the key to the dynamic is indeed life cycle, but the crucial prophylaxis is killing the adults not the eggs. Adult survival is likely to produce many clutches, but an egg/larvae which hatches and develops is a single fly (until they move into the adult, reproducing, category.)
Cordial regards to all.
One farm puts out a 5 gal bucket of fish guts and leftovers, partially filled, and leaves the bucket open just enough for flies to get in and lay their eggs. Shuts it in the summer heat for two days to kill the eggs, then cracks it again to let in any more flies to lay eggs and rinse and repeat and he has basically cut off the breeding cycle of the flies by having them breed in the fish guts and then killing the eggs over and over until there were very few flies at all on the farm.
Need a multi angle attack to kill the adults, stop them from laying eggs or kill the eggs and break the cycle from adult fly to laying eggs and hatching. Adult flies don't actually live that long. However, flies can travel a bit longer in distance when they smell something stinky than people expect. The chickens may not have covered the entire area the flies could have laid eggs in. Many DIY traps also work as well or better than some of the store bought ones as well. It's an ongoing battle to also keep manure picked up for us horse folks. We don't let it sit the way cow owners do and need to go compost it before it becomes useful.
adult not x
@@JeffThePoustmanYa, what you said, one thing for sure, dawn dish soap cures the flies in the house. Ya, just get a spray bottle from the dollar store and put 3 or 4 drops of dawn in it and it's on. It works for mosquitoes, also, because all bugs breathe through their skin, because they don't have noses, and the dish soap plugs up their poors. LMAO
At a guess, the sudden drop-off after a couple weeks is because you're catching the adult flies on the paper meaning that fewer were hatching during the next generation. Hopefully the fly paper will keep you at a manageable equilibrium.
Thank you, great information. We appreciate the time you spent on this! Best wishes
Man who pursues naturalism and healthy life building a farm. Real heroes in this world.
I admit I don't know you, but as a great grandma, I just want to say how proud I am of you for not only living your dream, but spending the time and money to make it an awesome success. I am now a subscriber and will lending what support I can. God bless you and all your endeavors.
Gotta love a great grandma's approval, very sweet
Well this comment certainly made my day better.
This comment is so wholesome
If anyone is wondering, the "Bee" shown at 14:05 is Vespula alascensis and was for a long time considered to be "Vespula vulgaris", the European/Asian variant of the "Common wasp" but were described taxonomically different due to molecular and morphological studies. They are locally known as a "Yellow Jacket" to the U.S. and true to their name (except for some anomalous colonies) they generally nest below or at ground level. While they are not directly beneficial they do assist in decomposition.
My man dropping the data ong
@@shirasplukioxd7155 I love insects and I love telling people about them so they're more familiar with the ecosystem around them and what insects serve what purpose lol
@@JavaAndroid I said in my last statement, while not directly beneficial (Meaning they are not primary pollinators), they break down organic matter making them scavengers. They also indirectly benefit the environment from as you said, killing pests. We're in agreement but do not misunderstand that they are not primary pollinators, the plants they do visit have other specialized insects involved in their reproduction cycle, they only help these plants a small amount which is why they aren't classified as primary pollinators
Yeah, I was like, "not a honeybee"
@@StillIntoBeetles hi! In my town we have the Tylobolus castaneus, a species of millipede in the family Spirobolidae. It is found in Northern California, typically between Fresno and Contra Costa. I'm in Sacramento. It's super cool! 🐛 Cheers to you
Greetings from Spain. The best bate I found for bucket traps is the left over liquid after distilling alcohol, especially wine. think it's called the backset or back wash. it attracts fly really good.
I was impressed by your video. You are a great farmer, your animals are very lucky to have you.
@GoldShawFarm Morgan, came across this video because I'm really into regenerative eco-agriculture, and I'm really surprised you missed the single most effective and beneficial fly suppression method: dung beetles.
(Besides lacking the benefits of the method I have in mind, all the traps you used produce plastic waste.) You need to have dug beetles on your land at high enough a density where any droppings landing anywhere get broken up and buried immediately. Dung beetles immediately swarm onto fresh dung and break up the dung into 3/4" balls, and bury them about a foot under ground, right in the root zone of the plants, and lay their eggs in them. This pervasive dung burial fertilizes your land far better than isolated cow pies burning the grass where they land with excessive nitrogen. Their larvae then eat the dung. Their burrows also perforate your land with 1' deep 3/4" burrow holes so that when it rains, the water soaks right in. By breaking up and burying the dung, they remove the habitat in which flies lay their eggs. They also naturally interrupt parasite transmission, since parasite eggs that come out in dung need to remain on the surface to contaminate new grass growth so that other cows will ingest them. By immediately burying the dung balls out of reach of new grass growth and having their larvae eat from them, dung beetles break the chain of transmission of parasites which propagate through shedding eggs in the dung of the cows.
Dung beetles are naturally symbiotic with large ungulates. When ranchers brought cows over from the old world, they neglected to bring dung beetles with them. That is the root of so much of the problems ranchers face with parasites and with flies. If you are going to raise cattle regeneratively, you should not neglect the employment of dung beetles. They are part of nature's way of managing ungulates. Sadly, it doesn't appear that the regenerative animal husbandry community knows about this. It would be great if you could test this out, and help get the word out. Managing flies should not involve a constant stream of plastic waste from fly paper and stinky traps in plastic jars and bags.
Fly control by dung beetles destroys the problem at the level of egg laying habitat. The way you're holding back the flies involves a constant running expense of fly paper and traps, and the constant production of trash, while the flies are still breeding and laying eggs in the cow dung. That's just not the best way to do it. No amount of trapping will get rid of breeding pairs of flies that lay hundreds of eggs in the cow dung heaps on the ground, but if your land has the proper saturation level of dung beetles, the flies never even get a chance to lay eggs on the dung because it all gets broken up and buried too quickly for them to even lay eggs. You're trying to stop the problem after the eggs have been lain and hatched into larvae, which have then pupated and matured into flies. That is a never ending battle. Dung beetles stop the problem before the flies can even lay eggs in the dung. You won't need to trap flies at such a high rate because they won't even be there; entire generations of fly eggs will not have been lain in dung, hatch into maggots, pupate, and emerge as flies.
Do a video search for Doug Pow, the Australian rancher who uses dung beetles on his land, and you'll see how it worked for him.
I was the 3rd like on this with it being here for 4 days. Critically underrated. Give this guy (and poor ol' dung beetles) some love!
Excellent overview of helping eradicate the fly problem while eliminating the need for techniques that create more waste. Great job at explaining this earth-friendly method 👏 👌
If nature has a problem, nature finds a way to solve its own problem. So fascinating, thank you for your informative comment 😁
All praises and thanks to GOD almighty for his wisdom in his creation. Thanks to you sir!
“Eco regenerative” 😂 Are you seriously recommending introducing an invasive species? Another armchair ecologist… great. Please don’t listen to this fraud.
My uncle used fermented shrimp paste and fishsauce as bait for the bucket fly traps, and they were sooooo effective.
Thats stuff is great on food as well :)
How does one get out of a bucket fly trap? Asking for a friend.
How was it done
@@Grunttamer is your friend a fly?
He just took an empty 1 gal crystal geyser, filled it halfway with water used, added some fish sauce, used a stick the spread the paste on the inside of the slanted walls. And the flies just goes in, get trapped and drown.
i am in awe of your efforts,i think i will take some of your advice and use it with my horse to minimize his flysuffering. love from norway
Great video. I must admit that as much as i enjoyed the review, i also enjoyed watching all the little extra things uve done to make your animals happy and healthy. Some grear ideas there ❤
The fact that you captured my attention the entire video on catching flies speaks volumes to the fact that you were made for making videos! So cool to see you acting on your dreams!
Same, the video just ended and I was confused, didn't realize I had spent so long watching lol
Same here man, i have zero business with cows and whatnot and watched the whole thing
I concur, doctor.
Same here I just happened on this video and I got a whole education of his farm and the flies was awesome. I thought it was a great video
Plus he has a natural, cool, easy and relatable way of talking to the audience
Considering all the obstacles you will have to overcome as a farmer I will say this. You are probably the most positive guy I have ever seen.
Much respect from Denmark 🇩🇰
Rancher, not farmer
@@xenxander But he says he has a farm, doesn't he?
Lol he’s not a farmer nor a rancher that’s a hobby
You are Doing A Great Job !
Realy Good To See .
Thankyou ! I have Lernt Lots .
Kind Regards
It's going to take about 3 years before your soil biome to get established. You need to get more chickens because they need to access the whole paddock the cows were in 3 to 4 days prior. Rem to train them to get on the piles is to put their grain on them. See if you can get some older hens from someone if excess eggs is an issue. Also contact your local food bank/pantry to see if they would like a source of eggs if you will be going with young hens.
And stay on the traps!
To quote my favorite natural path, "if you show up at my office with a broken bone I'm sending you to emergency to deal with the acute issue, then you can come back and we will work on supportive issues." Until your biome and chickens get to equilibrium, dealing with the acute fly overpopulation is the way to go.
Edit for clarity: going heavy on chickens is not the answer per day, but to have enough to cover the same size paddock as the cows. The predatory insects, the soil ecosystem takes time to establish. Overpopulation of flies is part of the process of attracting the predatory species later this year and more so next. The flies are a pioneer species in the permaculture sense. With some traps, you can feed the flies back to the birds.
Something will always go overboard, be it flies, buttercup, or mud, when cleaning up a mess. Just as cleaning out a closet makes a bigger mess before it gets better, returning semi-sterile/sterile land back into a functional ecosystem gets messy as things swing back and forth as balance is re-established.
great insight!
Excellent suggestions!
Yep, this sounds a lot like not enough predators for the flies to me! He needs a chicken empire ASAP. If he doesn't want too many eggs, he could weird chickens into the pasture, have them be "useful" in a way so he doesn't need to get rid of them. Have some fun breeding projects with the funny decorative breeds while also having them be a vital part of his farm
I was also thinking he can use rescue chickens from commercial chicken farms. They are being replaced because their egg production is going down, so if you have those mainly for pasture improvement, the eggs become a by product rather than the main product.
Also if that is their main job in the farm, let them forage most of their feed, using bought feed a supplement rather than their main food source, that will ensure they'll be even more effective in dealing with the spreading of the cow pies and the eating of the parasites.
I like the idea of donating extra eggs that are a hassle to sell, especially if you aren't spending loads on feed, won't feel like you are throwing away money.
@@thifasmom with bird flu still going around, I would not recommend anyone with already established flocks take in chickens from commercial farms.
One more inspiration: Birds also destroy EXTREMELY high amounts of flies. I don’t know if you have swallows where you live - but they are EXPERT insect hunters. Swallows require unique places to be able to nest. Maybe you can read up on it and provide for a lot of such nesting opportunities.
Swallows will nest practically on any wall that's sheltered from the elements, but they need a source of mud nearby to build nests.
Ducks.
@@leifharmsen Ducks can‘t catch insects once they are airborne.
But they are excellent at wiping out snails.
We have a bunch of nesting in the barn there's no way they can consume all of these
might be a problem with his cats.
It’s so wonderful you care about your livestock so much.
The only people who love cattle more are Cenk Uyghur, Vaush and Mr Hands.
We use fly bags for the barn. They work wonders too! Might be more convenient than the trash cans. But I’m so excited to see you making progress. I know how helpless those tiny buggers can make you feel as you watch your animals suffer from them.
Fly bags work good but they smell really bad
I thought he has Salt blocks with Garlic.
@@shawnmks3775 yep they stink. But always full of flies.
Fly bags work pretty good. Also those sticky balls. The scent is irrelevant if they're out in the fields.
We have the fly bags also for our chicken coops. They work very well.
I love how conscious you are about every decision. Not just for you or your cows, but the environment as a whole!
He's the exception not the rule... commercial beef production (aka being able to afford a pound of beef) can't replicate this example.
Amazing results. thanks for the tip!
Really enjoyed your video. I've never lived on a farm but found this very interesting and informative. If I'm bothered by flies this summer you can bet I'm going to use the flypaper on a bucket trick.
i love how he brought up how the cylinder traps harm honeybees and showed footage of a hornet
Hornets and wasps are also different. It was a wasp.
And wasps are endangered as well. While obviously not being very popular, they are important to the environment. In many countries in Europe killing wasps is illegal. It isn't so much an issue because there are barely none left ...
@@nami1540 I live in Europe and we have shed loads of wasps and you can kill them all you want. They are pests.
@nami Well not ilegal in europe... maybe just some country
@@nami1540 Tbf there are usefull wasps and then there are aggressive Wasps ...if we talk about bad wasp its mainly two subspecies of wasps..
I love how the fly paper has pictures of flies on it already - like decoys to lure in others. Who knew?😅
Umm that is mostly to lure customers though not actual flies 😂😂😂
RAID doesn't sell fly paper with fly imprints on them, or the ones I purchased didn't have them. The strips with flies imprinted on them work so much better than the plain strips.
Maybe this is obvious, but if there are already flies on it, the targets of the trap will think it's a safe landing site?
@@LJCyrus1 Just like Russian tanks in a minefield
They only put pictures of sexy flies to lure more future mates in.
Unlike a lot of professors on here you are doing a great job, you don't know everything and don't profess to, you read and experiment, then do what works best, over time this is what works, good job.
Cool video! I don't have cattle, but some of my neighbors do. I have no idea how they control flies. I now have a topic of conversation. Thanks!
About 20 years ago I sat in on a talk by a cattle producer in Central Texas. He carried 300 cow/calf pairs so he has a lot more animals to observe. One of his observations was that some of his cows had fewer flies than the others and so did their calves. He had an ongoing culling program, but after making this observation, he added a protocol for culling those with flies. He took it a step farther and found the bulls he was using on a neighboring farm and found the bull with the fewest flies. After a few generations of that, he now has a herd of animals that do not get flies. He culls for 1) unassisted live birth, 2) health (natural protection from worms so no medicines are needed), 3) ability to put on weight, 4) symmetrical appearance, and 5) no flies. Basically he has his own genome of cattle.
Genius LOL
That's a neat trick, breeding cows that don't shit. Anyone who's been to Central Texas can tell you its rich in B.S.
Amazing!
Holy (fly-less) cows! 🐂🪰🚫
Oh I certainly believe that. Plant 100 fruit trees and give them a year to grow. Take the top 10% and transplant them into the next plot then destroy the rest. Do the same with next years and subsequent years top 10%. Do several generations then take the top 10% of the best trees from the final plot. Now your in business with the best fruit trees around.
One thing you will want to be careful about with glue traps is the flies will attract insectivorous birds like wrens. If this happens you can protect the birds by getting a large flight cage with small bars, like they have for finches and canaries, that can fit over the bucket. The flies can get in but the birds are kept out - and safe.
yes, glue traps are indiscriminate and one of the most preventable hazards to wildlife deaths.
avoid using glue traps where you can, and when you have to use them, take measures to protect them from any larger critters who may wander into them or who may prey on the insects they trap. and check on them regularly so you can rescue wildlife that may have gotten stuck.
Good point!!
and if you see any stuck animals, pour a non toxic oil (some type of vegetable or canola oil would probably be fine depending on what animal it is) over the stuck parts and gently tug and massage the oil further into wherever the animal is stuck as you gently peel it away from the now-unsticky glue. works like a charm.
had a little blue skink completely stuck to a flat glue trap in my mamaws house. he was so stuck that i didnt even know he was alive until i saw his little ribcage move with a breath. vegetable oil spray got him completely unstuck with no glue residue on him in about 30 seconds, and then he was released outside far away from my mamaws door lol
@@ashleyjohnson9651 You're a hero! 😄
i have had sticky paper on all my trees for years to catch lantern flies and the birds come by eat some bugs and not 1 bird or animal has gotten stuck maybe the paper i am using is a bit less sticky but all i ever catch is undesirable bugs
Congratulations on solving your fly problem. I’m taking notes for next summer
When you said you try to rely on natural stuff I was like "uuuuh" and then you explained what you're doing and why and now I'm like OOOH! Agreed!
Honestly incredible that your cattle respect that SINGLE wire boundary setup.
Some farmers don't even use fences at all, their cattle go to graze and come back every evening. Contrary to popular belief animals enjoy being farmed and though they are eventually butchered and eaten they usually wildly exceed the average wild counterparts life expentancy before their time comes.
All these vegan activists and climate activists and all that dont know the first thing about animals
@@allistertheeldritchmemegod3537 I grew up a dairy farmer. Dairy cows do not respect boundaries and it's especially dangerous if you live near a busy highway lol. Yes, I agree that domesticated animals enjoy their lives on small dairy farms and we enjoyed raising and working them. Some day we will switch back to small scale farming as a society.
@@kevingutierrez1997 You should check out solarpunk, small scale community farming > Capitalist Industrial Complex
Highland coos are small and very gentle
Once it shocks them they don’t go near it again lol it’s electric
Not honey bees, those looked like yellow jackets. Also, you probably saw a several week cycle of new flies being born every day and you kept the pressure up long enough to see the last of the heavy fly -> egg -> maggot -> new fly cycle. Just a guess! Congrats on winning the war.
It was a Yellow Jacket. Plus.. just more knowledge.. Honey Bees are NOT even native to North American, they came from Africa.. so the only bee we need to worry about protecting here is the Bumble Bee.. that is Native and a great pollinator. Just does not produce honey like honey bees and that is why everyone is on and on about saving the Honey Bee.
Yellow jackets will actually still pollinate tho
@@brycep7093 I straight up kill every one of those suckers I can find. Not only because I now have a vendetta against them almost stinging me to death one year but as a bee keeper the fact that they also kill honey bees.
I have seen yellow jackets attack a small honey bee hive (after natural split) and killed most of the remaining bees
That is exactly what happened. He broke the breeding cycle by catching flies before they could lay eggs.
This guy loves his cattle and is a good provider for them!
I see this video as often as it pops up on my feed, third time so far, I love it.
It probably took two weeks to see results because of breeding. When you started, you likely had adults as well as larvae and pupae in the fields. However, by taking out so many adult flies, you had a smaller breeding population that couldn't replenish the number of flies you took out with the paper. I don't know if I said that clearly enough.
BTW, I think the "honeybee" you trapped with the wand looked like a wasp.
Yes, it seems like Vespula germanica.
I don't believe he was saying that the yellowjacket was a bee, just that he had caught bees and he showed a video of a yellowjacket that was caught which is not a fly.
Wasps are also valuble pollinaters
@@HymenBreaker While this is basically correct, this is not the case for Vespula germanica and V. vulgaris. In addition, both species are not native to the United States and threaten the insect diversity native there.
@@palladium1065 I didn't know that yellow jackets aren't native! I'm glad I do now though! I did however know honeybees are invasive.
Please look into attracting dung beetles to your pastures! They're actually amazing insects. They do loads of amazing things for farmers like decreasing fly populations :D, improving pasture fertility, and aerating soil. I think they would fit quite perfectly in your vision of your farm's ecosystem.
How does one attract ding beetles?
@@joconnor3567 with dung!
His area gets too cold for the typical commercial dung beetle. The native insects will migrate this year as the dung load gets established. Flies are the pioneer species, the rest are coming. I live in the maritime Pac NW and you absolutely have to use methods specific to your climate. Most of the predatory insects commercially available don't work sustainably this far north near the coasts. We have different bugs doing similar duties and it just takes time to attract them.
@@tjeanvlogs9894 love it! In every biome there are species ready to do the work. Don’t buy imported versions of your domestic workers. It’s just a really bad habit, whether you are fertilizing or controlling pests, or producing crops. Think local! 👍
I bet real life beetles are better than robot ones making randomly teleporting museums.
really enjoyed your video such a caring farmer
I own zero cows, but this was interesting and I watched it all the way through. Good job on the fly reduction, and cute cows!
Hey I’m a pest management professional, I would recommend a fly bait called Agita, it’s specially manufactured for poultry and cattle farms. It contains pheromones to attract flies, gives great results and is safe to use around animals. Doesn’t harm other insects
Thanks for this. I live in the UK and under my house there are rats. No professional has ever gotten rid of them, dozens or more have been to no success and the worst part is, is that they charge despite them never solving the issue🤦♂️ We've even had council members come that use stuff they said only they're allowed to handle and private companies aren't able to get ahold of it due to how dangerous/deadly it is....still didn't work at all. In fact, a week later I opened my shoe box and a big rat jumped out of it🗿😂 Getting rid of the rats seems impossible at this point. They can't get in the house anymore anyway as all the holes were all blocked, however, they die and then flies lay eggs on their corpses it seems which is the main issue.
Then through the summer especially, we get flies in the house more than you usually would and it's a pain. They come from underneath the decking in the garden and into the house, such a pain. We've used certain fly traps like the tape, but that doesn't work. Fly traps are limited in the UK it seems.
Going to look at getting this Agita stuff and using it inside a fly trap, will have to order it from abroad though. Do you have any fly traps you would recommend? I can only find the bag ones online and very few actual trap containers.
It would be nice if the flies would go inside a container instead of the house.
P.S. - UK regulations are different to US regulations (that's if you're American, most people here are), the UK is _big_ on health and safety. I imagine there's some stuff in the US that's dead effective that you can't get in the UK. What's the nastiest most effective shit to exterminate rats that you know of that I could possibly get imported to the UK? Thanks in advance.
Hi! I got mice - same problem. I have hung a plastic jar filled with dishsoap and water 5 cm under a small led lamp. The flies swarm arund the lamp and drowns. Cost me zero and kill 90% of all flies in most of the house, exept where the morning sun is shining on the windows.
@@maximusstorm1215 In the USA there are pest control experts who use mink as part of their rodent killing arsenal. Mink are very good at going into tight remote places,that can't be accessed by most other animals.They are very thorough little creatures and kill rats in huge numbers one right after th the other.
There's a UA-cam channel called "Mink Man", I think it's called.
Mink are native to the USA,so I don't know if they're an option for you.
@@maximusstorm1215 Rodent problems are easy. Get a good mouser cat, or introduce some local ratsnakes or something similar. Dont use poisons for rodents. Its terrible for native wildlife. That poison hangs around forever and moves up the food chain, effecting other larger animals. Introducing a rodent predator is far simpler and more effective.
@@gary7708 dear god that souns extremely painful for the animal, i mostly dont care about what happens to them but the way you discribed it made me imagine it, and now its stuck on my head lol
safe to say that you trained your cows perfectly. smart animals, they just needed to get over their fear of you.
Seeing them stand in line watiting for a paddock change is so satisfying.
keep up the great work Morgan.
I'm waiting for the video where we can finally see Morgan brushing them comfortably. There was one video where he was able to brush them while he was moving them, but they didn't seem to like that very much.
lol why should they get over their fear of him? he's going to have them killed.
@@asdfghjklqwertyuiopzxcvbnm2281 Maybe because it makes it easier to move them and give the catle a calmer life? Not that hard of an answer...
He should attempt to handfeed them everyday and slowly working up their trust, just take a handful of freshgrass and hold it out in front of you - it's gonna take a lot of patience at first but hopefully one of the more daring cows will take the bait and eventually the rest will follow - good luck Morgan!
I don't know why I just watched that whole video but you TELL A STORY so well it is interesting. I liked just learning even though I probably may never use your advice or experience but one day I will be able to re-tell this story and then I will know why I sat here and watched this whole video! Thanks for sharing! "-0
I'm watching you from morocco, here we do stuff differently, kinda primitively honestly, but I have been learning a lot from your videos and your experiments to invert the situation on my family's farm in the countryside, and things are going great 😃
I'd love to hear about what kind of experiments you've tried in your farm in Morocco!
That’s so cool!
That's awesome!
@@prana2000 I've been able to plant 13 chestnut trees after germinating the seeds the way morgan did in one of his videos using sand and a bucket, and I added some brushes for our cows in the barn and they seem to love them, I also build a coop house with wheels for our chickens to replace the old one which was nothing than a wooden big old box under the sun, and I'm currently working on hatching some goose eggs... I might start a youtube channel and film everything soon, never thought farming would be such fun
😊
you should put up some bat boxes to have some extra helpers!! They each eat around 1000 bugs a day so they should help keep the fly population down
I've read somewhere (sorry I can't cite the source) that a farmer / cattle owner has slowly "accumulated" bats and he now has over 100,000 - -- and no need for pesticides.
neat!
Fly paper blankets for cows 🎉
...or just just have a bunch of ducks around the cows
I take it duck eat lots of mosquitoes?
There is a reason you have almost a million subscribers, you are good. Cudos to you.
Super video. Thanks. Hello from South Africa 🇿🇦
Props to you and all farmers!! You guys feed us all and work so hard !! Congrats on winning the war against the flies!!
The vast majority of the worlds food comes from industrial companies posing as farms
I live in lancaster county, pa. Amish county.
In our area the amish farmers often have purple Martin colonies and blue bird houses on the tops of the fence posts for fly management on the farms.
I checked, I believe both bird species live in your area.
I hope that idea gives you so creative ideas.
In our area by the river, we have bat boxes for bug management like mosquitos.
Best wishes
Martins & Barn Swallows. Bats are also very helpful. It's amazing to see all the birds come out in force when mowing the fields, it's a feeding frenzy for them!
That's what Greg Judy does also... Swallows eat alot of flies.
I know an old lady who ate a fly.
I don't know why.
I think she'll die.
Natures pest control. I think the reason why the amish can do this though is that they don't use noise equipment that would scare all the birds away.
Hey I’m from there
Excellent way of multi faceted farming !
Congrats !
I love the extra large fly paper .. I have electric fences.. I wrap my fence post in the fly paper .. it works great
As someone who works in a warehouse and there's always that ONE fly that won't stop pissing me off, this is cathartic to say the least.~
If you get more chickens the excess eggs can be donated to food banks (tax write off) & scrambled up for your dogs as a treat. I like how you tested & experimented to find a solution for your problem. Keep up the good work.
The chickens themselves eat scrambled eggs 🙃🐔
@@Bedsheet_Necktie sad but true
I am no expert, but couldn't extra eggs be used to fertilize the land as well? The shells are good for soil. I like the food bank idea too.
Extra eggs can be frozen. Crack them put them in freezer bags a few at a time and freeze them. You can use them for baking or eating.
@@jjones9909 Aye. The calcium from eggshells are good for most succulent plants like eggplant and tomato, and some leafy edibles like lettuce.
I had some success with catching carpenter bees with a Shop Vac but it was a little work getting the hose close enough to them. For flies like that you'd have to increase the suction and catch area but it might be able to get a lot of them in a short amount of time.
LOL Love that.. "it becomes much easier than done." FOR SURE!
I bought three fly bags and I noticed that while they caught flys, the female flies dropped their eggs when they died or while stuck in the water. THEN those larvae hatched and grew into large flies making the bag look like it was working great, but it was the hatching eggs that caused the excess flies.
The good news is, if they're hatching in the trap, then it's working.
It had to be so. Those maggots didn't come out of thin air!
If the newborn flies are able to mature and escape their birthplace, then those traps need to be derated by _at least_ 1 dead fly.
The last thing you want is a killer-incubator!
Those are still flies in the trap rather than out flying around.
Living things can’t grow and mature without food or they will die because their cells will have no energy to work
Still counts as a win.
That's not a honey bee bro. That's a wasp. :) That said, this was a fantastic video. I grew up on a farm in southern Ontario but we didn't have this problem, despite the hot climate. When I got to Ireland a while back, I was living in the countryside and found it was just miserable even going for walks on the country roads because the fly problem was so severe. I realized it was because of the incredible density of livestock, but now, thanks to you, I also know it's because they weren't rotating their herds almost at all, and clearly not taking any preventive measures either.
How does a farmer not know the difference between a honey bee and what kills the honey bees? If that thing kills wasps, it's even better.
I think it's a yellow jacket
you the idiot he didnt say that was a honey bee.... he said " i have seen it catch honey bees before" learn to listen .... "Bro"
@@kp76333 it's a yellow jacket or hornet and it can burn in hell
@Frogger McSteinergold The footage of the wasp was B roll. He didn't take a video of the trap collecting bees, so he put the wasp video instead.
Great Idea.. your Cows look Happy😄
Thank you very much for the help!
Although I do not have a farm, I was curious about the fly trapping. This was just as entertaining as informative. I give it a 5 out of 5 dead flies...☺️
Curt Cobaine lmfao
I had a similar problem when taking customers on hikes, we got swarmed with flys when the women wear perfumed. I found a plant called Bog Myrtle that smells a little like a cross between eucalyptus and tea tree, I just grab some leave and rub them between my hands then over my head and arms. Seems to work well, keeps the mosquitoes and midges away too.
Ah yes keeps the midgets away
Have you tried my ex-girlfriend's minge juice?
Keeps everything away except the most determined Sailors on shore leave!
youre a good man, appreciate your ethics. hope you get more views
That's awesome advice even if you don't have livestock. Thanks.
This was a random video presented to me but really impressed with your video editing and creativity. You’re very entertaining and thanks for looking out for the cows - I’m know they appreciate it too!
I agree. I like UA-cam to be about 8 minutes though
Great evaluation. A process improvement suggestion: For prepping your plastic containers with the fly paper, instead of wrapping around, consider just putting on one wider side and cover the normal bottom and then continue to the other side. This leaves the less wide sides uncovered but you can prep more containers in less time. And there's no wasted of overlapped tape. And the clean up effort of pulling off the tape is simpler.
Also: it's less messy to re-position the containers since you have two clean sides of the bucket to hold onto. As your efforts reduce the fly population size, you may find the paper is effective for a longer duration and the benefits of cleanly moving around is a big benefit.
Good idea!
It looks like he needs the paper to overlap somewhat so it can stick to itself to stay in place, otherwise it would need a clip or something on the rim of the container to attach the paper to.
@@arcan762 that's possible. But, one can apply good quality double side tape ( like clear packing tape) and reuse that stickiness. Or, if it's possible, fold a little bit of the edge of the sticky side of the fly paper onto the bucket and wrap around. I can imagine this can be done easily with a yardstick to fold it backwards. Not too challenging to minimize the need for different types of tape. Where there's a will, there's a way! ☺️
thanks for caring. better for you too. awesome.
At first I laughed, but this is a man for the greatest respect, he has a problem and he is doing everything to solve it. I wish you success, sir! People like this made civilization! Respect!
Interesting. We ran 2,000 - 3-000 head. I don't recall ever having a fly issue. Generally, we didn't manage our feed as tightly as you do, unless we were putting them in a paddock of lucerne. So our cattle spread out a lot further.
My grandfather taught us that dung beetles & birds are the key to insect control. The beetles are great for breaking up cow pads. We have bird shelters & bird baths(for drinks) all over. Figure out what native species live in your area that like flies & encourage them
But be careful, ensure the insect-eating birds you attract don't eat your bees.If you aren't already doing it, you also want to encourage bees. they are great for crop yields.
Bees are definitely a saving grace for fruits.
Great Advise - man. I also think those paddocks are too tight..
This sounds like the true natural way for raising animals
Very very lucky of you
Definitely use vinegard in the bucket/bottle trap. My grandmother adds little pieces of anchovies which rot fast and attract more flies.
I bet sardines would be great, and cheap!
Awesome❣️Very helpful. Thank you💯🇨🇦🇨🇿
Nice farmer raises happy cows in lush fields. Liked!
And yeah, parts of Scotland have ungodly amount of flies so they're probably well adapted.
And that honey bee you caught was a wasp! Considering how rich those fields look, I wouldn't worry about the odd beneficial sacrifice.
14:11 that’s not a honey bee, that’s a wasp… I don’t mind catching a few of them too - I agree though, didn’t look like a very effective trap - love the ideas you shared here - great video!
Honey bees actually suppress the population of native pollinators, so catching a honeybee now and then helps the ecosystem. Look it up.
Yeah, I noticed that too.
That's not a wasp either. It's a yellow jacket.
@@krisknowlton5935 They are yellow jackets however, yellow jackets are wasps.
@@krisknowlton5935 Yellow Jackets are a type of wasp. I also thought it may be a YJ, but wasn't completely sure because there are other types of wasps with similar markings, so I played it safe by being more general.
im currently living in a tiny cabin on my bosses 160acre cattle farm. flies have been the biggest hurdle for me to get used to as far as farm life goes. i just ordered 10 rolls of fly paper and will be setting garbage can traps all over the place. this video just earned a new subscribe from me, you are doing gods work!
Hey how did it go?
Results of the slaughter?
But, they’re gods flys!
@@ozziejim8472 Maybe satans flies, as they love to BUG us
What was the result if you don’t mind me asking?