I don't know whether these are gnats or something else, but they're really annoying.

I was in my yard yesterday working on power washing the fence (to get the mold off). When I was in the grassy areas, I was constantly bombarded by little flying nuisances. It's hard to count them, but at most times in my field of view I could see at least 30 buzzing around my head, with a half dozen landing on me at any given time. I could swat the air and hit at least six at a time, sometimes more.

Is there anything I can do about this? Can I do it myself or am I going to have to call someone? Are these gnats or something else?

Wear a hat with a brim, and spray the brim with a little bit of deet.

I got some permethrin this year to see if it helps keep ticks off. I don't know yet if it will work for ticks or gnats.

For black flies they alsways go for the top of your head. So, an old hat with a piece of fly paper on top. I call it my "Flies be screwed hat." It also makes for a great fashion statement and conversation topic with dead and dying flies on your head.

My experience with gnats is indoors, but maybe my experience can inform yours:

Gnats and other flies don't live very long. If you have a lot of them, it means that they are breeding somewhere nearby. This is why I am nervous about restaurants with flies in them: Those flies are breeding on the premises somewhere, and since flies breed in unsanitary places, it means that soemwhere on the premises is an unsanitary place.

I worked in an office once where I would be sitting there minding my own business at my desk, and I would get gnats bothering me. In a standard cubicle farm, in an ordinary modern office building.

Check the kitchenette and the garbages... nothing special, other than that sometimes the gnats would be attracted to the food there. But no breeding places.

Check the potted plants. Hm. A few gnats in the soil of one of the potted plants. Okay...

Hey, there's this coworker with like, a dozen potted plants in his cubicle. A few gnats in his plants, but nothing hugely major. Hm. Look at the last potted plant...

A small cloud of gnats comes out of the soil of that potted plant when I poke at it. The owner of Plant Cubicle is out on vacation for a couple of weeks, so I have no recourse but to place his infested plant outside the office, in the garden.

A few days later, I'm still seeing gnats in my office. That means they're still breeding somewhere. Go back to Plant Man's cubicle.

Under his desk I notice... A big old bag of potting soil. I look more closely, the bag is not sealed. The top of the bag is folded over, but it's not 100 percent closed. I reach out for it like a horror movie victim slowly reaching for the doorknob... And of course as soon as I touch it, a cloud of gnats comes out.

Bag of potting soil gets unceremoniously placed outside. Gnats in my office are gone the next day and do not return.

Thanks, Tony. I'll look around the property for stuff like that. From what I've read, unremoved lawn clippings and dead leaves in flowerbeds can contribute to the problem, so I might work on that too. There's also a strip of land behind the row of houses on my street that's a common area. I don't know who is responsible for it, but I suspect the answer is "nobody." Well, that area starts right behind my fence, and I only noticed recently that there's a roughly 15sqft area of dead leaves piled about 6 inches deep. I can't imagine that's a good thing.

I'd hate to hire people to clean up an area that's not even mine, but that might be what I have to do...

Call Vector Control, let them deal with it.

I'm sorry, I completely missed your post, which is too bad because it took another 3 hours of research to come around to Permethrin

Actually, that's only one of the three things I ended up ordering, but let me back up a bit.

On Wednesday, the problem had built to a head. I was in my yard talking to an arborist about our trees and seeing if anything needed to be done with them. While I was out there I never stopped swatting away at the horrible swarms of gnats we were getting. There must have been hundreds in the air around the two of us.

So, more determined than ever, I did a deep dive into the web and found three products: Permethrin, Pyrethrin, and Nylar. That last one doesn't say Nylar anywhere, but I'm pretty sure that's what it is - it's meant to prevent the eggs from maturing into adults.

I mixed a couple tablespoons of the latter two (the Permethrin hasn't arrived yet), and sprayed the entire backyard and most of the front.

Today I stood outside for at least 15 minutes with a mug of iced tea, and I might have seen one gnat while I was out there. I'm not sure if this mixture did the whole job, but something sure did. I don't think it was just the nice weather, because my wife and I went to a show last night and the venue had a severe gnat problem outside.

Anyway, if this works, it'll be well worth the ~$70 I put into it, especially considering that a service wanted to charge me $840 for the season. I might have to refill these chemicals once or twice before the bug season is done (I need to spray at least once every two weeks), but I'll still be ahead on cost..