Revenge of the Flies !

[sailorboy1]

So we had been sailing for 14+ hours! Had just sailed out into the open ocean to find some cool air and the next morning had changed course to take a round about path back home.

So around 9-10am we are out with no one in sight, when there comes one of those sight seeing type of ferry boats. And of course in all that open water they are heading right for us!

Now I am starting to get alittle used to this; the various sight seeing and whale watching boats changing course and coming close to us, as I'm starting to think to the people on the boats maybe a sailboat in the open water is a good sight because the whales have pretty much left the area for the year.

So the boat does this little loop around me, that pisses me off because I'm tired and now I have to watch out for him, and then he drops anchor so the passagers can do the promised 45 minutes of fishing that must have been part of their ticket. I guess the boat capitan figured that there would be fish at a spot that a sailboat had just been at, even though all the fishing boats had blasted pass us hours prior (not another boat of any type in sight).

Now come the flies!!!! And I figure they had to be from the sight seeing boat because I bet we had not gotten closer than 3 miles to shore and the wind was blowing toward shore. There hadn't been any flies on the boat prior to this! And I'm talking a fly invasion, not like maybe a dozen, I'm talking what seemed like hundreds!

So a BIG battle commences. The flies think our legs look and taste good! We of course don't feel like being their main course for a meal and start killing them. The battle gets very serious and both battle groups start taking various tactics, from ambush to frontal attacks. We went from waiting for them to land to attack and kill them, to chasing them around the boat to bring the battle directly to them. They in turn would regroup into platoons and counter-attack!

We also noticed that once in while they would attack each other, and later determined there were 2 type of flies involved. If only we could have found a way to encourage them to continue to attack each other instead of us!

We even tried bringing out the bug repellent. This was Cutter Skin So Soft, which has 6% deet in it. It said right on the bottle that it was effective for mosquitoes and biting flies. Great it works for biting flies, sounds perfect!

So I spray my legs down with the stuff and it's like a magnet to the flies. They can not get enough of the stuff and even the ones that had been hiding suddenly were on my legs! I even sparyed some directly on a couple and all it did was make them go into a drug induced dance then come back for more! But, it seemed to dope them up and slow them down, so more fly killy was done per swing (got a threesome and a couple of double kills).

This went on for HOURS!!! And the dead flies got so bad in the cockpit that I had to wash them the cockpit a couple times becaus eit was getting nasty in it. But this would result in a new fly attack as it appears that they liked some sea salt seasoning with their leg meal. So the killing would start again and we had killed what seemed like hundreds as the battle had been ongoing for a long time.

We finally could take it no more and the thought of continuing to where we had planned to anchor for the night just didn't sound good anymore. We could not face the chance that were going to be trapped on the boat with the never ending supply of flies. So we changed course and headed to our home port so we could abandon ship and get away.

It took 4-5 hours to get home. All the time the battle continued! Once in a while there was a pause so the flies could rest a little for the high speed flying they were doing to avoid our killing atempts. It was real hard going though the mooring field and catching our ball as the flies seemed to know when your hands were full and would plan a group attack (hard to steer though the field while something is biting your ankles)!

But we must had finally killed all the flies because as soon as we moored they seemed to disappear and no new group attacks occurred. Except for 2 whole outs, that while where especially mean and fast, finally suffered a direct hit and were had thier life blasted away.

Or maybe the group had just wanted a ride to Salem, MA to start with. And knowing where we were from and were driving us across the Mass bay to get there!

[Vasco]

Hey, you didn't try the plastic bag of water trick?

[sailorboy1]

Originally Posted by Vasco

Hey, you didn't try the plastic bag of water trick?

What is it and how does it work? I now believe that knowing more about fly killing is more useful than knowing a new storm tactic.

[zeehag]

plastic bag of water trick does NOT work--have some in my boat and i still have as many if not more than i had before placing them..
there is a powder here in mexico --auton... and is spozed to kill mosquitos and flies-- we will see reallly reallly soon-- flies and skeeters this year are malicious. maximally. will keep posted on the magic powder thing for fly killing ---

[sabray]

Battle report long island the flys attacked off jersey coast the square Floatie cushions were deployed you can get a large kill with these. A worthy tactic is to go forward the flys will settle in the cockpit. Now sneak down the side and surprise them with a frantic bashing. If the tourist fishing boat is still near by this will provide them with great entertainment. The cockpit drains on sabray were clogged with casualties. The charter fishing boat has reported a lone sailor loosing his mind at sea and was last seen beating his boat with a cushion.. I have taken on an improved chemical arsenal. A local fog was reported on long island sound yesterday in fact that was my anti fly chemical fogger being deployed.

[S/V Antares]

If you are cruising the Chesapeake do not go near the old WWII target ship on the eastern shore side north of hoopers Island. It is LOADED with flies. Agressive, huge and nasty. The will swarm on any boat that comes near.

[justdoit]

We thought it was only us! Left AtlantIc City at 9:00 am heading for Block Island. About a mile out we got invaded too. At first I figured they were coming from shore but 6 hours and about 600 flys later we were sure we had a rotting corpse in the bilge. They were like flying piranhas, attacking us in swarms. We also tried Off bug spray both on our legs and spraying them directly. Didn't even phase them. This went on for a full 10 hours until the sun started to set. We discovered there is quite a difference in fly swatters along the way. The cheap flimsy ones could kill by just getting close. The more expensive and rigid one required a direct hit. But at the cheap ones started to fall apart we really started to worry. To go below required a swatted in each hand. My primary tactic was to offer my bare legs as bait and then swat with both hands as they tore into my flesh. We also learned that a light hit would leave an intact fly but swatting them too hard would leave a fly blod stain in the cockpit. We even got to the point of enjoying watching partially disabled flys hobble around the cockpit. As this went on we dreampt up a video game and a horror movie plot about our adventure. Finally we broke out the portable vac and sucked up the nearly 1000 flys we had killed. Even sucked up a couple of live ones and enjoyed watching them squirm around in the canister. I never knew I had such a twisted mind. Here it is Sunday and I think I just killed the last one.