What kind of feeder do you have? Are they big housefly types or tiny ones like gnats? Fortunately I haven't seen any get into my Perky-Pet feeder.

I get an occasional ant or worse, earwig in my hummzingers and I change the nectar every other day. yuck.

Hmmmm...I rarely get anything inside of my Hummzinger mini feeder but I do change the nectar every 2-3 days. It will be interesting to hear what others have to say. I'm also curious about the type of feeder you are using. Maybe that is the root of the problem.

Charlotte

I occasionally get a few bugs, smaller than house flies, but not many. Considering I have alot of bugs visiting it, I would expect alot more entries, but luckily I don't. One night I went out to remove and clean the feeder. I unscrewed the bottle and pushed my finger through the removable split base and there was a yellowjacket INSIDE! I can't figure out how it managed to fit in! Again, considering all the yellowjackets at the feeders, one is nothing ;)

I did just buy one of the PP saucer feeders (16oz) from Lowe's for $10, and haven't seen any bugs inside, yet. My hummers seem to like this feeder better than my other two.

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Charlotte - I have my hummzinger (large and mini) feeders in full sun and if the ant moat dries out, the little pests march into the nectar. This is why I change it every other day. Ruth

I use both the bottle-type (PP Four Fountains) plus the saucer type feeders (Humzinger Mini) and get small fly-like insects in both.

The "flies" are smaller than houseflies, with a shiny green-gold body. They are also attracted to some of the hanging baskets, especially my Gartenmeister fuchsia.

More of them seem to get into the Humzinger. Even when I use the yellow bee guards on the Perky Pet bottle feeders, they still get in there. Sometimes they get caught inside the bee guards, and can be hard to get out of there.

I just change the feeders every other day, so the nectar doesn't get too nasty.

I've read that the color yellow attracts bees, flies and other insects...and hummies go for the color red over any other color - something about the light spectrum of the colors and the insect's or bird's ability to detect it.

Guess that's why all those fly traps are yellow :o)

Maybe if you used red bee guards or spray painted them red?

~ Cat

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The flies (or perhaps a small type of wasp?) that I was referring to do sound like those that Hummer K8 also has. They are very attracted to my salvia plants as well. I am using a bottle type Art Line feeder. The little flower opennings are yellow, so I'll try painting them red. Also, when I used the red nectar, it wouldn't fill up with flies as quickly, but now that I'm using a 1:4 sugar/water, there are dozens of trapped/drowned flies withing a day or two. This must be because of the higher concentration of sugar.

On another note, while I've seen a few hummingbirds during the past few years, none have come to the feeder yet. I'll keep trying before I give up...

HummZinger makes a feeder that keeps out flying insects. The HummZinger Ultra has plastic guards at the feeding ports that allow hummingbirds to feed but keep out bees, wasps & flies.

Here is a link that might be useful: HummZinger feeders

Since my last post, I tried using one of those glass yellow jacket traps, and the green/gold shiny flies went in there and got trapped as well. Helped a lot with both yellow jackets and the flies.