General Care Discussion :: Fruit flies in water

[laxmom]

I have been trying to get rid of fruit flies that have been reproducing in my turtle tank for 2 months now. I have done complete water changes, scrubbed everything, and they still come back. The turtles seem ok but I don't know if it can hurt them long term. I have a 55 gallon modified reptile tank that I just can't pick up and rinse out. The flies are a nuisance, but can they hurt the turtles? I have 2 small res. Advice! Thanks.

[BullDog]

I recently had the same problem.
What I did was aim the filter output at the surface so there's a lot of current surface so they can't lay eggs. Also, the thing that really helped was good ol' fashion swatting. The first day there was a whole bunch of flies that I squashed, then a little bit less every day until they were basically gone.

As far as I know, they don't hurt your turtles.