A couple of years ago I came downstairs one day to find the conservatory was full of hoverflies - I have no idea where they came from, one day there was none and the next it was like a plague. I opened the back door in the hope that they'd fly out to freedom, but when that didn't seem to be the case I had to break out the fly killer.

I had a bottle of raid in that trusty old 'cupboard under the kitchen sink' so I gave that a good blast around the conservatory, then shut the french doors into the rest of the house and gave it time to take effect. A short while later when I looked out they were no longer flying about the place, but had left a thin carpet of them on the floor ready for sweeping up.

I didn't really want to kill them, I honestly have nothing against hoverflies, but they didn't leave when I opened the door to the garden so I couldn't see any other way around it and Raid did a very effective job.

Since then I've occassionally used Raid around the house when I notice a small group of flies. As I do have pets I don't like to (forgive the pun) go into overkill and spray this stuff about the place like there's no tomorrow. So when it comes to using it I tend to give it a small, quick blast as close to the fly/flies as possible in the hope that this goes diestly to them and doesn't linger around in the air too long. This method seems to do the trick for me.

One downside I can think of, and this would apply to all of these fly killers, is that as the spray doesn't kill immediately, sometimes the insects drop to the floor dead somewhere you don't notice and you find them some time later where they may have dropped dead into a pile of papers on your dining room table - a bit icky, but not much you can do about it.

There is of course the smell as well, however careful you are there's no getting away from the fact that you have to be close to the spray in order to use it and the smell is very overpowering and unpleasant. You can tell from that alone that the product isn't exactly good for your health without having to read the label and that's one of the reasons why I feel it's best to use as little as possible, preferbably away from pets/children and in a well ventilated place or an area you can vacate until it has disapated.

The container itself is the traditional spray can - much like that of a deodorant and it's very clearly labelled. The only thing I would say is the spray is easy to activate so you'd definately need to keep it out of the reaching hands of little children just incase they get curious and end up spraying it in their faces.

The canister I have has lasted me two years up to now as you don't need much to be effective and unless you have some sort of infestation, you shouldn't need to use it much anyway. I can't remember how much this was when last purchased, but a quick google seems to be bringing up average prices between £1.60 and £2.20 which I would say definately represents good value on a per useage basis.

At the end of the day this does work and gets red of those nasty, pesky little flying things that always seem to be able to fly in the open window, but never back out of it. However it should be used sparingly.