the weekly entry · no. 4 · 15 jun 2026
entry no. 4 — the great fungus gnat eviction
warm weeks plus damp soil equals the summer swarm. this week: the six-euro plant i'd still buy over anything fancy, how to break the gnat cycle without spraying your bedroom, and a reader question about those tiny black flies.
rubber plant: the glossy tank
underrated and nearly indestructible: thick shiny leaves, forgiving about water, and it grows into a real tree if you let it. the 'boring' plant that quietly outlives the trendy ones.
starve the gnats, don't spray them
fungus gnats breed in the top layer of wet soil. let the top 2–3cm dry out fully between waterings, add a couple of yellow sticky traps for the adults, and the cycle breaks in about three weeks — no chemicals, no gnats in your face at 7am.
“tiny black flies keep coming off my plants whenever i water. are they harmful?”
almost certainly fungus gnats — more annoying than dangerous. the adults don't hurt the plant, but the larvae in constantly-wet soil can nibble young roots. the fix is drying out that top layer (bottom-water for a while so the surface stays bone dry), and sticky traps mop up the survivors.
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