<h1>1 citrus fruit fly</h1>
Citrus fruit fly, commonly known as "citrus maggots", belongs to the order Diptera, Mangosteenidae, Fruit Fly, Subgenus Large Fruit Fly. It is an important quarantine pest that harms citrus and grapefruit, and is also one of the international quarantine pests, with the characteristics of strong specificity, wide spread and great harm. The worm lays eggs in the young fruits of citrus, and the larvae hatch and eat the fruit, causing it to fall off and rot, affecting the yield and quality of citrus, and even causing consumption panic in severe cases, resulting in large-scale slow sales of citrus.
<h1>2 Morphological characteristics and life habits of the large fruit fly
</h1>
Adult fruit fly
Morphological characteristics: Adults are 10 to 12 mm long, and females are counted as egg layers, and about 6 mm are added. The body color is brownish yellow, the compound eyes are golden green, and the center of the back of the chest has dark brown "human" markings. The wings are transparent and the veins are yellowish brown. The third section of the ventral dorsal black stripe intersects in the form of a "ten" character.
Life habits: Adult insects are generally active during the day, especially at 1 to 4 p.m., and stop moving after dark. Adult insect activity is generally 21 ~ 30 °C is appropriate, sunny days are more active than cloudy days, rainy days are rarely active, if the temperature is too high, often seek shade to inhabit, such as the shady side of the leaves.
Large fruit fly eggs
Morphological characteristics: the egg is milky white, oblong oval, slightly curved in the middle, transparent at both ends, smooth and unscathed, about 1.5 to 1.6 mm long.
Egg-laying marks in the large fruit fly
Spawning habits: egg laying begins in mid-June, and July to August is the peak of spawning, and the location where adults lay eggs has certain differences for different hosts. Navel oranges, rock sugar oranges and other sweet oranges are mostly produced between the waist and navel, and there are often milky protrusions at the spawning place, and the epidermis of the protrusions is cut with a knife, and there are obvious halos around the egg laying hole; honey oranges, red oranges, etc. are more abundant near the navel. The spawning site is mostly round or oval brown holes, often spilling oil esters and accumulating outside, easy to touch by hand.
Large fruit fly pupae
Morphological characteristics: pupae are oval in shape, about 8.5 to 10.2 mm long, 4 mm yellowish brown in width, blackish brown before feathering, and the anterior valve milky protrusions in the larval stage are still clearly visible.
Feathering habits: Overwintering pupae emerge in late April when the temperature reaches 20°C, and bloom in early May. The distribution of pupae in the soil is generally within 5 inches above the surface, and the soil temperature of the overwintering pupae before feathering is too high, which is not conducive to its feathering, and even dies. Pupae are mostly erect in the soil and are difficult to feather if placed horizontally.
Larvae of the great fruit fly
Morphological characteristics: maggot-shaped, milky white to milky yellow, glossy, about 14 to 16 mm in 3 instars, 15 to 19 mm in old age, with a fine tip at the front and hypertrophy at the rear end. The hook is black and often retracted into the chest.
Life habits: The larvae moth in the fruit are pests, and the damaged fruit first turns yellow around the egg laying and hatching larvae, and the yellowing phenomenon begins in mid-September and is most common from late September to early October.
<h1>3 Summary of the law of the pest of the big real fly</h1>
Citrus flies only harm citrus, with limes and sweet oranges suffering severely, followed by grapefruit red oranges, and occasionally lemons, citrons, and bergamot. The larvae feed on the inside of the fruit, often making the fruit yellow before ripening, and falling fruit early, which seriously affects citrus yield.
At the same time, the fruit that has not fallen off after the infestation contains a large number of maggots, and the damaged fruit generally has 5-10 citrus maggots inside, and more than 100 heads, which is called "maggot fruit". The flesh is rotten, smelly and completely loses its edible value. The degree of selective egg laying preference for different host plants is navel orange> mandarin orange > honey orange. Citrus fruit flies prefer to lay eggs on fruit types of about 3.3 cm in diameter.
Through the investigation of citrus fruit fly food species, it is not difficult to find that the citrus fruit fly is still very selective for different hosts. Based on this, we can consider planting a small number of citrus fruit fly favorite varieties such as sweet oranges in orange orchards, which will improve the damage situation of the entire orangery.
<h1>4 Citrus fruit fly control methods</h1>
The control of citrus fruit flies is mainly to do a good job of "four passes", that is, plant quarantine (cutting off the source), sealing adult insect feathering out of the earth (eliminating pupae), booby traping adult insects (booby traping adults) and picking up and destroying "maggots" (removing larvae).
1. Ground spray to kill pupae and emerging adults. Late April to mid-to-late May is the excavation period for adult feathering. Especially when the rain turns sunny and the temperature is high, the feathering is most abundant. Control the feathering of large solid flies, do not allow adult feathering to be unearthed, and the prevention and control of ground spraying in May is the key. At this time, it is possible to regularly spray the enemy insect or octylthion granules under the tree tray, and then mix the medicine into the soil to poison the adult insects that are being feathered.
Fly balls
2. Canopy spray to kill the adults before spawning. Early June to early July is the period of adult feathering and spawning, which is a critical period for canopy spraying. First, it is necessary to unify the spraying time, combined with the prevention and control of other diseases and insect pests, implement the spraying and sealing of the whole garden, and strictly prevent the citrus fly from laying eggs on the fruit. The use of citrus fruit fly adult worms before laying eggs have the habit of feeding and supplementing nutrition, combined with food booby traps, commonly used food booby traps are sugar, wine and vinegar. Generally every 3 to 5 trees hang a jar. From the end of May to the end of July, the solution is changed every 5-7 days. You can also use a "fly trap ball" to stick to a large solid fly (pictured above).
3. Remove the fruit to kill the larvae. The citrus fruit that has been damaged by the big fruit fly begins to turn yellow at the end of September, and then falls fruit. After the maggots land on the ground, the old mature larvae inside crawl out and burrow into the soil to pupate, and become the source of the citrus fly in the second year. The removal of the unripe first yellow worm fruit not only preserved the control results of that year, but also prevented the old mature larvae from entering the soil and laid a good foundation for the control of the large fruit fly in the second year. From late September to mid-November, remove the maggots that are not ripe and yellow, yellow and red, and clean all the ground fruits on the ground for boiling treatment and centralized deep burial treatment, so as to kill the larvae and cut off the source of insects.
Note 1: This article and the picture comes from Sohu, author: Citrus Industry Alliance, the article has been deleted, infringement please private message.
Note 2: If you like these articles, you can pay attention to us, and we will continue to push pest control articles in the future.