We’ve had problems with fruit fly in the past, ruining peaches, tomatoes and capsicums- now that we’ve got several fruit trees we want to ensure we actually get the fruit minus the grubs. So gross discovering fruit filled with squirmy, undulating maggots. And they are so sneaky too-fruit can look perfectly fine on the outside but still be full of grubs! I was looking for a product that would kill the grubs if they got into the fruit-but it looks like these sorts of sprays have been discontinued. The products available for battling fruit fly seem to be attractant type sprays designed to lure in the adult flies and poison them. They are applied as a spot sprays around the garden, or used in traps. The traps available looked a bit ugly-like plastic kitchen jars, so I decided to get some glass bud vases to try these out instead-they seem to be similar to the fly traps with only small holes at the top for entry. They look a bit nicer hanging around the garden-so hopefully they’ll be effective. I’ve filled them with Yates Natures Way Fruit Fly Control, so far they don’t look to have caught any flies-but maybe we don’t have any in the area yet, there’s been no grubs in the passionfruit and mandarins that are ripening. I also got some exclusion bags from Green Harvest for extra protection-they are meant to stop the flies from laying eggs in the fruit. They suggest the bags may also help protect fruit from birds too which would be very handy. I only have a bag on one of the blueberry bushes for now-protecting our bumper crop of just two fruits. We finally got our first blossom after the cold snap this week! We’d started thinking we wouldn’t get any because winter had been so warm. It’s on the peach tree-and there seems to be lots more buds getting ready to open. Hopefully the cold will stick around for a bit and the buds will develop into fruit. I’ll try out the exclusion bags on these if they do start fruiting because fruit fly and birds LOVE stone fruit. We’d had four little figs on our fig tree when we got it-two fell off, not sure why, maybe just because of transplanting. The last two fell off this week with the help of a certain big puppies tail-dogs are so helpful in the garden! It’ll probably be better for the tree settling in without the fruit on it, but bit disappointing we won’t get to try a fresh fig. I've never actually had fresh fig before-but they look pretty.
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![]() "And this, our life, exempt from public haunt, finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, sermons in stones, and good in everything." William Shakespeare Archives
February 2017
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