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What herbs keep flies away


Fly Repellent Herbs - Tips For Using Herbs To Repel Flies

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General Herb Care

By: Amy Grant

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It doesn’t really matter where you are located; flies seem to thrive almost anywhere. Truly, I think there is really nothing more annoying — except maybe mosquitoes. How can you win the battle without papering the house with fly strips or using toxic sprays to eradicate the pests? Believe it or not, there are herbs that repel flies with the additional benefit of looking beautiful and smelling fantastic.

The following fly repellent herbs can be planted just outside the door, in areas such as decks or patios where you tend to sit, or inside on the kitchen window — basically anywhere that you want to repel flies with herbs.

The fly repelling qualities of herbs are heightened when the foliage is bruised or moved about, allowing the essential oils — the fly bane — to release. Herbs that repel flies may also be of the dried variety and seem to work just as well.

Herbs that repel flies include:

Fly repellent herbs such as those above can be used fresh, dried, or made into a salve of their essential oil combined with beeswax and base oil. You can also blend fresh leaves from these herbs with vodka, strain, and then place them in a spray bottle to mist areas, yourself, or pets (also livestock) to repel flies.

The method of using herbs to repel flies and other pests and vermin has long been used before we came up with toxic chemicals in a can. Not only do they beautify, but they are environmentally friendly with aroma therapeutic benefit — and no can to dispose of.

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Plant These Herbs to Repel Flies

By

Amy Jeanroy

Amy Jeanroy

Amy Jeanroy is a master gardener and farm homesteader who has operated a greenhouse business since 1999. She served as the herbal gardening expert for The Spruce for eight years. Using her expertise in herbalism, she makes and sells herbal soaps, tinctures, salves, teas, and recipes at farmers' markets in Maine. She has also authored three books on canning and fermenting foods.

Learn more about The Spruce's Editorial Process

Updated on 09/26/19

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Biting flies are a problem for man and beast. Unfortunately, the hot and muggy weather that invites us outside and into the garden also is perfect for flies. The good news is that herbs can be quite effective in repelling those biting flies, reducing the need to spray your yard or yourself with chemical bug sprays. The plants themselves can help repel flies and other insects in your garden, and you can use the herbs to create an all-natural bug spray and salve to protect yourself.

Herbs That Naturally Repel Flies

Plant fly-repelling herbs in your garden or in movable pots, which allow you to keep them near doorways, on patios, next to your potting bench, or wherever you spend a lot of time:

DIY Herbal Bug Repellents

One easy way to keep flies away is to rub any fly-repellent fresh herb on your exposed skin. Just pick a few leaves and rub it in. You can also kick the herbs' repellent aromas (repellent to flies but not to us) into the air by simply brushing the plants whenever you walk by. You and your garden will smell great, and it tells those little pests to back off.

To make a simple bug-repellent herbal spray, combine a selection of fresh herb leaves with vodka in a blender and blend until smooth. Pour the mixture through a strainer to extract the liquid and transfer it to a spray bottle. Spray the areas that you want flies to stay away from. This trick has been used successfully on pets and small farm animals as well.

Herbal Bug-Repellant Salve

A salve is like a thick lotion that is rubbed into your skin. These have been used by herbalists for centuries. Homemade salves are easy to make and last a very long time, so they're definitely worth a little bit of work. To make a salve, you will need:

Warm the oil in a double boiler and slowly add grated beeswax. Stir until the beeswax has melted, then add the essential oils. Pour the mixture into jars or tins while it is warm enough to pour easily. Let the salve cool before use.

Herbal Bug Spray

A homemade bug spray should be in every gardener's toolkit. It's very easy to make and can be placed in a small spritzer bottle that sits by the front door or on your potting bench. Spray a little bit on your skin every time you go out into the garden.

An all-purpose blend smells nice and wards off all sorts of pesky insects:

Add the ingredients to a clean spray bottle, and shake well. Feel free to replace any of the essential oils with other repellent scents.

TOP-7 repellant plants that repel flies and mosquitoes

Talking about the seasons, Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin claims that he could fall in love with “red summer”, “if not for . .. mosquitoes, but flies.” Yes, the presence of some insects significantly complicates the life of summer residents, if no action is taken. The problem is that some sprays, Velcro, coils and other protection methods can cause allergic reactions or irritation in people. It's good that plants that repel mosquitoes, flies, midges can come to the rescue.


Which plant repels with its smell

When you start to get interested in this question, it turns out that there are quite a lot of plants that protect the territory from harmful insects. Conventionally, they can be divided into three groups:

Essential oil repellents are represented by aromatic herbs: fragrant rue, coriander, fennel, cloves, wormwood, mint, tansy, thyme and others. All these plants contain essential oils that disorient insects in space and intoxicate them. The smell of some herbs has insecticidal properties.

Guardians of the vegetable world include carrots, mustard, onions, parsley, garlic, basil and others. Onions and carrots, for example, are often specially planted in tandem. After all, the onion fly does not tolerate the smell of carrots, and the carrot fly does not like the smell of onions.

Flower repellents are well known to many. These are marigolds, calendula, comfrey, yarrow, nivyanik, narrow-leaved lavender, large-rhizome geranium, pyrethrum, large nasturtium, chrysanthemums and many others. Particularly good results in repelling and even killing insects can be achieved if repellents are grown in arrays.


Examples of effective repellant plants

When choosing plants for your garden or flower bed, it is good to remember all the useful properties of these crops. Then you can land them not in an arbitrary order, but in such a way that they turn out to be as effective as possible. Let's talk about some of the plants listed above in more detail.


# 1 Lemon Melissa

Citronella is a popular mosquito repellent that exudes the scent of lemons. The lemon balm smells about the same. You can use Citronella as a repellant, but it is much more pleasant to plant lemon balm in your garden to enjoy its aroma and the absence of bloodsuckers.

Lemon balm is a mosquito repellent that should be used very carefully. Melissa loves to take over neighboring territories, pushing out other cultures. Since this plant has good winter hardiness, it has significant advantages in the fight for survival.

# 2 Lavender

Another plant that repels mosquitoes is lavender. However, its merits do not end there. Lavender is afraid of slugs, ants, aphids and even moths, which this plant successfully drives out of cabinets. Many will remember that the dried plant is placed in wardrobes. It is surprising that insects are afraid of lavender. After all, it has a beneficial effect on people: it improves sleep and mood, and calms.

Lavender seeds and seedlings of various varieties can be purchased at the Home and Garden store. Look, maybe you need such a fragrant protector?

# 3 Basil

This plant is considered to be universal. Basil is an excellent seasoning that gives meat dishes a special taste and aroma. If this plant is located near the dining table, mosquitoes, flies and even mosquitoes will not be able to annoy those who want to eat. After all, basil has the power of an excellent repellant.

If mosquitoes have already managed to bite someone from the household, it is enough to crush a few basil leaves between your fingers and apply them to the blister. The essential oil of this plant quickly relieves not only itching, but also the swelling itself.

#4 Mint

The smell of mint is well known to many. Peppermint's menthol flavor repels mosquitoes, aphids and whiteflies. This plant protects against flies. You can enhance the smell if you knead the mint leaves with your fingers. To protect yourself from mosquitoes with the help of this culture, you need to rub the areas of the body free from clothes with mint. When fresh, it repels ants well, and when dried, it repels mice.

#5 Calendula

To protect yourself from mosquitoes, it is enough just to plant calendula near the house - marigolds, well known and loved by us since childhood. This unpretentious and cold-resistant plant is easier to start than to breed. It has such an indomitable vitality. Many flower growers grow this medicinal plant in pots right in city apartments.

#6 Rosemary

If mint or basil leaves are kneaded with the fingers to bring out the more intense aroma of these plants, rosemary gives off a strong scent when its branches are simply swaying. Not surprisingly, in windy weather, the aroma of rosemary intensifies. If this greenery is grown at home in a flowerpot or pot, you can simply move this structure to get the same effect.

Mosquitoes cannot stand the smell of rosemary. And the itching from the bite of these little vampires can be relieved by applying a few crushed rosemary leaves to the swelling.

#7 Ageratum

This spectacular flowering annual attracts many gardeners. Its beauty does not go unnoticed. And the fact that he is also a repellent is just great. Those substances that this flower produces do not just repel or kill insects, but affect their development and, in particular, their reproductive system. Mosquitoes and midges simply try not to fly into the places where the ageratum grows.

#8 Thyme

A sunny meadow or even a window sill in a city apartment is a good place to grow thyme. Here, this plant feels great, exuding a rather strong aroma that becomes an insurmountable barrier to mosquitoes.

All of the listed plants protect people and animals from insects that annoy them. They are often grown on plots or even in apartments. However, there is a point to which attention should be paid. All these plants smell strongly, which means they can cause an allergic reaction in people. Before using flowers for flies and mosquitoes, make sure they are safe for you.

Plants repellent against flies and mosquitoes

Many flowers and plants are natural repellents - repellers, and even exterminators of insects - and as such have been known to mankind for centuries. If you want mosquitoes and flies to fly around your site a mile away - read on.

Repellent plants

All repellent plants can be conditionally divided into two broad categories: protectors of the garden from pests and defenders of man and his home from flies and blood-sucking arthropods - mosquitoes, mosquitoes, fleas or ticks.

We will definitely talk about what plants stand as a human shield in the way of the Colorado potato beetle and other eaters of lush greenery in the following articles. This text is about human protective plants.

Let's divide green "defenders" into two conditional categories to make it easier to plan plantings: essential oil crops and flowers. Efironoses are often planted compactly on a small piece of land - in the so-called "pharmaceutical garden" with medicinal plants. And very in vain. It is much more rational to distribute them throughout the garden in the form of border, framing or mixed plantings.

The same applies to repellant flowers, which have a place not only in flowerbeds, but also in locations where you and your guests spend a lot of time - around gazebos, summer kitchens, outdoor toilets, next to the veranda, swimming pool.


Essential oil plants that repel mosquitoes and flies

We must say right away that the list given here is not complete and is limited to plants that are easy to grow, and their repellent effect has been confirmed by scientists. When you finish reading, share your opinion about plants that repel mosquitoes and flies in the comments.


Basil. The most famous garden ethereal against flies and mosquitoes. The plant repels arthropods with a smell, and itching at the site of the bite can be removed if you knead and attach a leaf.

Mint and Melissa. Known plants from mosquitoes. Choose varieties with a more pronounced menthol flavor.

Rosemary. Grow this spicy herb under the windows of the house and closer to the summer kitchen. Essential oils of rosemary will scare away those mosquitoes that have passed the mint cordon.

Agastache or anise lofant. A powerful mosquito repellant, a regular in any European garden or front garden, not widely used in our gardens. A perennial plant that does not require complex care.

Anise. Not only effectively disperses flies and mosquitoes, but also attracts beneficial pollinating insects to the garden.

Lemongrass. One of the most effective live mosquito repellants on earth. The plant is thermophilic and is grown only in a pot culture, but in summer it can be put on a veranda or terrace in a container. Seeds are rarely on sale, but we have them.

Thyme, also known as thyme. Perennial essential oil and beautiful groundcover. Mosquitoes fear him like the plague. To enhance the effect, you can rub a few shoots of thyme in your palms.

Fennel. Rocker planting plants can completely protect the summer kitchen, porch or terrace from flies. At the end of the season, the seeds can be harvested and used as a spice.

Railing. A beautiful plant with purple leaves, it is included in the vast majority of Japanese dishes, gives a spicy taste to salads, and is used in sushi. And once again and forever scares away flies.

Rue. An undeservedly forgotten spice and flavor for liqueurs, salads and desserts. In medieval engravings and paintings depicting court sessions, a bouquet of rue is always placed next to the judge. Do you know why? Because it is the most powerful repeller of fleas and bedbugs. Flies, mosquitoes and even ants are afraid of this plant like fire. A nice bonus is that rue is a frost-resistant perennial that is completely maintenance-free.


Flowers from flies and mosquitoes

Repellent flowers can not only scare away arthropod bloodsuckers, but also decorate the garden, and also effectively disguise such obligatory, but unsightly garden artifacts as a summer toilet and a compost heap.

Lavender. A wonderful perennial that retains repellent properties both cut and dried. In summer it will scare away flying arthropods, in winter it will scent clothes and bedding in the closet, destroying moths along the way. Lavender angustifolia grows well in the middle lane.

Calendula. Bright and extremely easy to grow, the annual scares away many garden pests and has pronounced repellent properties against mosquitoes.

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