The safest method of removing fruit flies is to trap them in a home-made or purchased lure.

More on fruit flies.

This fruit fly trap was made from a plastic soft-drink bottle and hung in the branches of a kiwi fruit vine. The 'doorways' can be cut with a heated knife.

Recipes for these vary; one that has long been recommended is a mixture of sugar, soya sauce and ammonia.

The theory is that the flies are lured into the bottle where the ammonia asphyxiates them. If you like, you can add an insecticide, derris probably being the best.

Another is kerosene, creosote and mothballs placed in cans hung high in trees or placed on vegetable stakes. Vegemite, sugar and water is another.

You need to put out your lures as soon as the flowers fall (for fruit trees), and renew the mixture every week or so until the last of the crop is over. Commercial lures are usually mixed and splashed on the foliage every few days but they contain 'non-organic' insecticides.

Destroy any fruit affected by fruit fly by burning, boiling or dousing it in kerosene before you bury it. You can't just bury it or put it out with the garbage - the flies will simply continue their life-cycle in the ground.