Fungus Gnats making their presence known across the area

LYNCHBURG, Va. (WSET) — Be on the lookout for Fungus Gnats, a bug with a less-than-appealing name.

Many people in our viewing area are saying these bugs are swarming their homes.

These bugs come hundreds at a time to your home and even try to get inside.

Scott Baker with the Virginia Cooperative Exchange says not to worry, they're just a nuisance.

He said they are attracted to light, so they tend to be more noticeable at night.

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If you think about nighttime, if you have your phone on or a laptop with a bright screen, that's probably drawing them," he said. "You may not notice them as much during the day, when there's ambient light, but at night when everything else is dark but you're computer screen, they're probably going to come to that."

They live and reproduce in the soil of potted plants, so if you have any in or around your home, beware.

"They really need a very moist potting soil, so if you're keeping your potted plants, that soil, really wet, you're gonna have problems," Baker said.

Their life cycle is short, only 7 days, but they do reproduce fast, so taking care of those potted plants is important to get rid of them.

Since they're mostly a nuisance, if you can focus on the root cause, which is to look at your potted plants in the house and try to dry out that potting soil," Baker said.

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He said they can do some damage to plants if there are too many of them.

"If the populations are super high, you might see some damage to plants in the larval stage," he said. "They can do some feeding on roots, but typically we don't find that they're a real plant pest, so it's not something to get overly concerned about."

Baker said during the garden season when these gnats are outside, they can give people quite a shock.

They have a tendency when they're in their larval stage to move as a mass across either a sidewalk or a yard, or something like that, and look like a garden snake," Baker said. "It's really quite freaky if you've never seen it, but again, nothing to be concerned."