When the nice weather arrives, your porch is where you want to spend a lot of time — but pesky bugs can be a problem. Whether you’re enjoying the sunset from your favorite Adirondack chair or hanging out with friends late into the evening, insects will surely join the party at some point. If flies, in particular, tend to come to your porch and frustrate you, you may be unwittingly attracting them. So to prevent flies from gathering on your porch and your time spent outside, a simple swap can help. Check your porch lights: Are they glowing with a cool, blue-leaning light? If so, they can play a major role in drawing flies to your porch. Swapping out those cold light bulbs for ones that emit warm, yellow light can help keep flies away.
The color of your porch lights or outdoor lights can affect how many flies and other insects hang around. Research presented by American Association for the Advancement of Science It has been found that warm lighting attracts fewer insects compared to cool lighting – after testing incandescent, halogen, compact fluorescent and light-emitting diode light bulbs, warm colored LED bulbs with yellow to orange light attract the least insects. In fact, even warm lighting from basic LED bulbs performs better than “bug lights” or bulbs specifically marketed to limit insect attraction.
The worst offenders when it comes to drawing insects to light? Incandescent bulbs that emit a cool blue light proved to be the most attractive. So if you’re hoping to make your porch less attractive to bugs like flies, a light bulb swap might do the trick.
Swap outdoor light bulbs to make them less attractive to flies
To put this simple fly-limiting swap to work for your porch and other outdoor spaces, start with Choosing the right light bulb colors – and that means taking color temperature into account. other Key Light Bulb Terms You Need to Know Include the light bulb’s wattage, which tells you how much power it uses, and lumens, which refers to the brightness or amount of light the bulb provides. But color temperature will help you understand what color the bulb is giving off, as well as its warmth.
Because insects such as flies are drawn to cool blue light, avoid bright white and daylight color temperature bulbs. Bright white bulbs strike a middle ground between white and blue, with a temperature range of 4,000 to 5,000 Kelvin. Daylight bulbs are similarly cool-toned and also emit blue light with a temperature range of 5,000 to 6,000 Kelvin.
Instead, choose soft white or warm white bulbs, both of which are lean yellow. Warm white bulbs are soft yellowish-white and warm, ranging from 3,000 to 4,000 Kelvin. However, soft white is the yellowest – and possibly the most fly repellent – option. Soft white light bulbs fall between 2,700 and 3,000 Kelvin and deliver the warmest yellow lighting. Another simple trick that can help discourage flies is Stop leaving your porch light on at nightTurn them off whenever you don’t need their light. This way, you will remove the wavelengths that these lights emit that make them so attractive to flies.
