Fruit Fly

If you’ve ever grown fruit of any kind, especially during spring and summer, you will know that fruit fly can be a real nuisance. However, there is an easy solution to help control these pesky insects.

 

Fruit Fly damage 

In our hot climate, fruit flies cause much fruit loss from stinging the fruit. It is the female that is laying eggs in the fruit after mating with the male. The female lays the eggs just below the skin or surface of the fruit and this is what we see as the sting. Once the eggs hatch, the larvae of the fruit fly, which are small maggots at this stage, feed off the inside of the fruit before turning into adult fruit fly. The end result is spoilt fruit that goes rotten and is wasted.

 

Stop the mating to stop the stinging!

The trick to stopping the females from stinging the fruit in the first place is to kill the male fruit fly before it mates with the female. You can do this by using Searles Fruit Fly Traps. Searles Fruit Fly Trap is a specially designed trap containing a fruit fly wick.

 

Practice hygiene

It is very important to practice good hygiene when dealing with fruit fly. Fruit fly are attracted to the smell of rotten or spoilt fruit. Always remove any rotten, stung or spoilt fruit from the fruit tree and the ground below the crop, as these will attract fruit fly. If you intend to compost this spoilt fruit, do so as far away from your crop as possible and not leave the fruit exposed to the air. Chooks, ducks and geese make excellent cleaners around fruit crops as they consume any fruit that falls to the ground as well as eating the flies themselves.

 

More Citrus ‘Plant Hospital’ topics:

– Citrus Leafminer
– Citrus Gall Wasp
– Citrus Scale
– Aphids

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