Managing Silba Adipata McAlpine AKA "Black Fig Fly"

Figland

Member
I saw a very interesting discussion that maybe got a little too heated called "Fighting Black Fig Fly with Brix". I don't like to call it that because other flies are also nicknamed that, since this is a worldwide challenge and the silba adipata mcalpine is the main "fig" fruit fly that I have been reading about. There are several others, though, of soft fruits, like grapes and berries. Someone also posted an article that had pictures of both the fig wasp, and it looked like silba adipata mcalpine. Here is the website created by our friend from France who has done extensive research on this insect, and has shared many, many observations. In Europe, as well as North Africa and other parts of the Mediterranean, there are specific treatments available for this pest. Since it is new to the United States, it will take time for protocols to be developed.

During the process of developing protocols and testing them, there must be sharing and discussion and even argument. We must be able to weather these disagreements and still come back to the table with our thoughts, insights, experiments, ideas and results. We need everyone's insight. I am watching the devastation to the soil and health of my crops in my area due to increased wind and heat events. The very high chlorides in our irrigation water. We all must find ways to restore the health of our soil. We have been taught that insects are drawn to unhealthy plants. Given the state of our water, soil, air this could be one reason the fruit flies are staging so many appearances.
 
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Someone also posted an article that seemed to have some errors-maybe AI generated. It had pictures of both the fig wasp, and the silba adipata mcalpine (it looked like.) The fly may have been named differently in other countries- may be possibly part of the problem. It had some useful information in it and did seem to support the trend of the discussion. It is possible it was edited by someone who does not speak English as a first language and that may be another part of the problem with it. It is also possible that in other climates, black figs and green figs may attract the flies differently than in the climates that are dealing with them on this continent. Francois, who created the first link I posted, spoke about that in his writings on "Ourfigs" when this first came to light. We were so fortunate to have his insights then and we will need to develop our own now. I have been contacted by people working on this from other countries, they are out there and eager to hear our ideas and results. Let's keep working together please! https://worldofplants.ai/en/black-f...tnRn0qIryiMFgMyGG5BoHkocOOiwvNnjnzh5hmdsDyc1E
 
I feel bad that yall have to deal with that evil critter.
We have swd that's bad enough, I can't imagine adding BFF to the mix.
Always something.
Sad that these discussions turn into argument, they shouldn't.

On another note, really nice to see you Ellen. :)
 
I feel bad that yall have to deal with that evil critter.
We have swd that's bad enough, I can't imagine adding BFF to the mix.
Always something.
Sad that these discussions turn into argument, they shouldn't.

On another note, really nice to see you Ellen. :)
Thank you for that kind welcome good sir! Swd is a tough one too! A farmer's nightmare! I believe we can beat this pest. We will have to work together though, and that may be more difficult than we thought but we can manage it. There were good ideas on that thread. ( And good people-but that goes without saying!;))
 
I’ve been learning quite a bit about things that can affect pest pressure, including BFF. I’ll probably write more about it in my newsletter at this point. It’s hard to share information when it doesn’t feel like it’s wanted or well received. Plus, many are attached to conventional ways of thinking. I don’t understand why there was a need to argue in the one thread, but it was what it was. Regardless, there is one way to defeat these things and that is to work in harmony with nature, not to war against it. Nature will always win wars. 🙂 This isn’t a lost cause and pests can affect every plant humans cultivate, so it isn’t anything new. Some will find a way through.
 
am watching the devastation to the soil and health of my crops in my area due to increased wind and heat events. The very high chlorides in our irrigation water. We all must find ways to restore the health of our soil.

Only bare soil can be damaged by wind and heat. It’s a mismanagement of farmland problem.
 
Only bare soil can be damaged by wind and heat. It’s a mismanagement of farmland problem.
Well maybe normally but we had some pretty serious Santa Ana events in 2024 and especially last month that blew the avocados right out of the trees and scoured the mulch right off the ground, it wasn't "bare" to begin with but we are going to have to bring a lot of material back in to cover it. Trying to find places for the frogs to "hunker down', still hear them so they did. Saw the first native Bumble Bee yesterday so there is hope! Difficult to do "cover crops" with orchards with surface feeder roots like avocados and limited water. It damages the root systems. When you have months and months of 90-100F temperature and little rain it can do a lot of harm to the microbes and fungi in the ground. We were just fortunate to escape the firestorms, it's "bone dry" in our neck of the woods! Moisture in the air and soil has been extremely low. You might have heard of the horrific fires in Alta Dena and Pacific Palisades. Down here we also had fires but not quite close enough to damage our property but it came close, It did make us get an air Purifier so we could breathe. Power shut offs, clouds of smoke that darkened the sky. Evacuation orders, the whole scary story. Climate Instability is a real thing.
 
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I’ve been learning quite a bit about things that can affect pest pressure, including BFF. I’ll probably write more about it in my newsletter at this point. It’s hard to share information when it doesn’t feel like it’s wanted or well received. Plus, many are attached to conventional ways of thinking. I don’t understand why there was a need to argue in the one thread, but it was what it was. Regardless, there is one way to defeat these things and that is to work in harmony with nature, not to war against it. Nature will always win wars. 🙂 This isn’t a lost cause and pests can affect every plant humans cultivate, so it isn’t anything new. Some will find a way through.
I think the biosphere is fragile and humans often misunderstand the limits, I realize that some of the crops grown here are not feasible long term because of the limitations of water, and lack of humidity that they might need, we might not be able to make this work for much longer, and rethinking and redesigning farming systems to be more like the natural systems that the plants evolved in might work better but it will take up more space. Because we are all stuck here together, ( whether we like it or not) we have to find ways to share information that might be valuable and can make a difference or help us develop our thinking. All of this is emotional and that is not something our society has taught us to manage or understand well.

I appreciate all of the insights shared and I am going to look into the JADAM info that you guys were sharing because it may hold some answers or ways to approach this that will be fruitful. @RosyPosy on OurFigs was using a Peach Ferment extract in traps that was from the JADAM way of farming that was actually catching this insect. She had some very informative posts sharing that. People have had a lot of difficulty actually catching it in traps, so it is not as easy as just setting the trap and finding them.

There is a huge difference in a neighborhood where you cannot stop the flies from coming into your property and a farm or more rural area where there is more isolation. That I think is part of the frustration that the people who are dealing with this have. I considered yanking out all of the fig trees, planted and wild here, when this insect first became known. It might have even worked for a short time, enough to stop the first wave of the insect, but we were hit with a fruit fly quarantine and then had to treat with a spinosad product for a full year. As it turns out, that product was the only thing so far that the CA scientists have to offer Organic farmers. They don't have any other protocols except bagging the fruit, or cutting down the fig trees or stripping the fruit for a season. As usual, the Organic farmers are on their own so we don't have a choice but to try to figure it out.

Some of the people on that other thread have done a LOT of work experimenting and testing. They have no choice, their area is infested with a pest menace. If we keep trialing and sharing, we will get better at stopping it. Trapping them in early season Caprifigs worked for me last season. I was able to sell fresh figs. I cut a LOT open to test to make sure. I also check EVERY fig tree every day during fruiting season and I have fruit on some of the trees right now. It may all fall apart this year but I don't think so. I know of one real "fig farm" not far from here-he and his neighbors have given up on the crop because of this pest. I don't know that much about his practices other than he has rows of trees that he prunes like grapevines. Not an organic or regenerative farmer.

The page I posted a link to shows pictures of ants attacking and eating the larvae, lizards do also, squirrels do also, birds do, there may be more vectors of insect control that we don't know about but it seems that an intact ecosystem with lots of diversity is our best weapon so the arguments you and a few others are making are important. We need to learn more about ecosystem relationships where the fly has been a problem and how that might help us to solve our current invasion. a scientist once told me that an "intact, diverse predator ecosystem" was the best defense against the psyllid in citrus. We have a citrus psyllid quarantine in our area but I am not seeing the psyllids ( and I look for them), so I think that is another argument for predators at a higher level than the fruit flies. By the way, scientists working on the psyllid problem discovered that they can trap the psyllid with lights, because they cue on the light reflections off the leaves of citrus trees-this may be what the "Brix" measurement is related to, it could also correlate with colors on the leaves, the amount of carbohydrates, "sugars" and chlorophyll created by efficient photosynthesis. From indications with this fig fruit fly, it is attracted more to scent cues but I don't think they know that for sure yet. ( Someone somewhere may know.)

The males are attracted to sap, they eat it, but the females, when they are in egg laying mode are looking for something with more protein in it and can be attracted to other types of bait. It would be interesting to look into their behavior and what can attract/distract them from a target. it sounds like some answers have been found, these are good lines of study and experimenting. Even if the first things tried don't work or are not "natural" enough, finding something that can affect the insect is one way of approaching this. I can't experiment in this way because our property is certified organic and that means we can't use the chemicals and treatments that conventional growers or backyard hobbyists can. Sometimes you are in an "emergency " situation. While still serious, I don't think it is an "emergency" here. I have found strategies that work for my property and encouraging/protecting the native predator insects is one strategy. The mulch situation is important because I also have ground nesting bees and I have to observe them to understand where they are nesting. I'm going to have to do another map of the entire property after the storms because they are likely destroyed and they will have to build up their numbers again. I have to be careful even adding mulch or moving things around, I don't want to damage the areas where they would nest. Happy to see a Native bumble bee recently so that means they are still here, although in less numbers than they should be.

Regardless, i made this thread so people will come back to the topic and discuss if they want to. We need more information and more interaction to solve this pest challenge! Thank you to everyone putting in any effort or interested or impacted. Don't give up!
 
I think the biosphere is fragile and humans often misunderstand the limits, I realize that some of the crops grown here are not feasible long term because of the limitations of water, and lack of humidity that they might need, we might not be able to make this work for much longer, and rethinking and redesigning farming systems to be more like the natural systems that the plants evolved in might work better but it will take up more space. Because we are all stuck here together, ( whether we like it or not) we have to find ways to share information that might be valuable and can make a difference or help us develop our thinking. All of this is emotional and that is not something our society has taught us to manage or understand well.

I appreciate all of the insights shared and I am going to look into the JADAM info that you guys were sharing because it may hold some answers or ways to approach this that will be fruitful. @RosyPosy on OurFigs was using a Peach Ferment extract in traps that was from the JADAM way of farming that was actually catching this insect. She had some very informative posts sharing that. People have had a lot of difficulty actually catching it in traps, so it is not as easy as just setting the trap and finding them.

There is a huge difference in a neighborhood where you cannot stop the flies from coming into your property and a farm or more rural area where there is more isolation. That I think is part of the frustration that the people who are dealing with this have. I considered yanking out all of the fig trees, planted and wild here, when this insect first became known. It might have even worked for a short time, enough to stop the first wave of the insect, but we were hit with a fruit fly quarantine and then had to treat with a spinosad product for a full year. As it turns out, that product was the only thing so far that the CA scientists have to offer Organic farmers. They don't have any other protocols except bagging the fruit, or cutting down the fig trees or stripping the fruit for a season. As usual, the Organic farmers are on their own so we don't have a choice but to try to figure it out.

Some of the people on that other thread have done a LOT of work experimenting and testing. They have no choice, their area is infested with a pest menace. If we keep trialing and sharing, we will get better at stopping it. Trapping them in early season Caprifigs worked for me last season. I was able to sell fresh figs. I cut a LOT open to test to make sure. I also check EVERY fig tree every day during fruiting season and I have fruit on some of the trees right now. It may all fall apart this year but I don't think so. I know of one real "fig farm" not far from here-he and his neighbors have given up on the crop because of this pest. I don't know that much about his practices other than he has rows of trees that he prunes like grapevines. Not an organic or regenerative farmer.

The page I posted a link to shows pictures of ants attacking and eating the larvae, lizards do also, squirrels do also, birds do, there may be more vectors of insect control that we don't know about but it seems that an intact ecosystem with lots of diversity is our best weapon so the arguments you and a few others are making are important. We need to learn more about ecosystem relationships where the fly has been a problem and how that might help us to solve our current invasion. a scientist once told me that an "intact, diverse predator ecosystem" was the best defense against the psyllid in citrus. We have a citrus psyllid quarantine in our area but I am not seeing the psyllids ( and I look for them), so I think that is another argument for predators at a higher level than the fruit flies. By the way, scientists working on the psyllid problem discovered that they can trap the psyllid with lights, because they cue on the light reflections off the leaves of citrus trees-this may be what the "Brix" measurement is related to, it could also correlate with colors on the leaves, the amount of carbohydrates, "sugars" and chlorophyll created by efficient photosynthesis. From indications with this fig fruit fly, it is attracted more to scent cues but I don't think they know that for sure yet. ( Someone somewhere may know.)

The males are attracted to sap, they eat it, but the females, when they are in egg laying mode are looking for something with more protein in it and can be attracted to other types of bait. It would be interesting to look into their behavior and what can attract/distract them from a target. it sounds like some answers have been found, these are good lines of study and experimenting. Even if the first things tried don't work or are not "natural" enough, finding something that can affect the insect is one way of approaching this. I can't experiment in this way because our property is certified organic and that means we can't use the chemicals and treatments that conventional growers or backyard hobbyists can. Sometimes you are in an "emergency " situation. While still serious, I don't think it is an "emergency" here. I have found strategies that work for my property and encouraging/protecting the native predator insects is one strategy. The mulch situation is important because I also have ground nesting bees and I have to observe them to understand where they are nesting. I'm going to have to do another map of the entire property after the storms because they are likely destroyed and they will have to build up their numbers again. I have to be careful even adding mulch or moving things around, I don't want to damage the areas where they would nest. Happy to see a Native bumble bee recently so that means they are still here, although in less numbers than they should be.

Regardless, i made this thread so people will come back to the topic and discuss if they want to. We need more information and more interaction to solve this pest challenge! Thank you to everyone putting in any effort or interested or impacted. Don't give up!
Yes, I am RosyPosy on OF. 🙂

The information on pest control that I’ve been studying goes against conventional thinking on growing, but makes a lot of sense if someone is open minded and gives it a chance. There’s some great research done by people showing the importance of microbiology in both the soil and plant itself. There’s also some great information on how voltage together with pH affects what is going on with plants. In fact there is a chart that shows the different Eh/pH levels along with what type of condition is being experienced with plants that adds so much insight as to why things happen when they do. It harmonizes with the Brix information.

But in order for these things to be effective and to get results, people need to let go of the way we’ve thought of how plants work the last half century or so because it is not correct. This is why we have disease or insect problems. We really do not need ag departments to tell us how to handle things, in fact, that’s part of the fault of the system we are in. It’s not about getting a product to kill something off—the pest, or whatever it is, exists for a reason and it comes to the plants for a reason. When we understand the reason, we can deal effectively with it because the insect will just leave the plant alone once the reason is taken away.

But we have such a mentality of buying a chemical to grow things, it seems hard for that adjustment to be made by many people because we never knew otherwise. The whole paradigm is faulty. People shake their heads and wonder why they have issues, but then they also don’t want to question the system and look into if it needs to change. Change can be hard for people. But there is a superabundance of information telling us it needs to change because it is ruining our earth and our and our animals’ health.

I hope you get the information you are looking for, Ellen. 🙂
 
It damages the root systems.

Look at Elaine Ingram’s soil food web she has lists of perennial low growing cover crops plants. These are permanent ground cover.
There is a lot of debate these days as to whether ground cover competes with the crop plants or not. The thinking on this is shifting a bit.

Gabe Brown, Ray Archuletta, Elaine Ingham, James white, John kempf, Arden Anderson, KNF, Jadam, bionutrient food association, Tom Dykstra, green cover seed, Christine jones, Nichole masters.
These are the recommendations we have on soil and plant health. Since our contexts are so different everyone one has to kind of pull the bits and pieces from all the information out there that works for them.
Like we need to move water away from plants here for parts of the year. And you are desperate to retain water.
 
Climate Instability is a real thing.


Climate “stability” has never been a thing to be fair. Maybe an easy decade here or there. But over centuries no. If agriculture doesn’t plan for instability it will always struggle.

Dont take this as a lack of sympathy for your unique and difficult challenges.

I assume for your wind problems you have already thought about wind breaks.
 
Climate “stability” has never been a thing to be fair. Maybe an easy decade here or there. But over centuries no. If agriculture doesn’t plan for instability it will always struggle.

Dont take this as a lack of sympathy for your unique and difficult challenges.

I assume for your wind problems you have already thought about wind breaks.
Thanks for your insights, happy to contemplate this, we are always trying to figure this out, but to be honest, like being in a hurricane, or a tornado, it's not really something that we can address on our puny level. 70-80 MPH winds are not going to be held back by the type of windbreaks we could plant or construct, for the most part. I have a lot more research to do on what options there may be. What we are facing with the Santa Anas, and they were very late, unfortunately this last year, so they did cause an extreme loss of important crops, is an increase in intensity of storms and an extension of their activity throughout the year. At this point they are almost happening all year long. This is caused by an extreme amount of energy in the system and that actually is partly due to a "Solar maximum" we are facing, but it is also impacted by the lack of moisture for the last year over the entire region. Burning of fossil fuels ramps this up, more greenhouse gases released and that has to stop or be limited for us to have any relief. What is in the system now will take time to dissipate. The recent fires are just a sign of bigger challenges, but if one rages through here, I'm not sure what we could do. We have plans but if they drop the fire retardant our farm is done- will lose our certification. Due to changes in federal policy and practices we will have to rethink our design of our crops and native habitats. It's difficult to be realizing that it may be the end of our ability to compensate. The silba adipata is just a symptom of a bigger problem. I actually think we can beat that, but it will take coordinated effort.
 
Look at Elaine Ingram’s soil food web she has lists of perennial low growing cover crops plants. These are permanent ground cover.
There is a lot of debate these days as to whether ground cover competes with the crop plants or not. The thinking on this is shifting a bit.

Gabe Brown, Ray Archuletta, Elaine Ingham, James white, John kempf, Arden Anderson, KNF, Jadam, bionutrient food association, Tom Dykstra, green cover seed, Christine jones, Nichole masters.
These are the recommendations we have on soil and plant health. Since our contexts are so different everyone one has to kind of pull the bits and pieces from all the information out there that works for them.
Like we need to move water away from plants here for parts of the year. And you are desperate to retain water.
Yes, they are awesome, have attended lots of their presentations. The difficulty with avocados ( our main crop) is that they are not well understood by people growing other crops. You don't want to have anything else growing under them, because they have a large feeder root network. It extends throughout the grove. "Cover cropping" in the traditional way cannot be done in the root zone without harming the avocado trees. Most cover cropping systems that I have seen rely on deciduous tree cycles which are different than sub tropical trees. Subtropical trees do not really have a "dormant" season so you can't mow and dig around their roots like you can with deciduous trees or crops that come and go. We have seen damage in our grove from some perennial cover so we have been moving away from that. We use the seed bank plants as a base and try to add to that. We have to keep them away from the avocado tree roots. Deep and heavy mulch might be the only solution at the moment. We lack the water to be able to effectively grow any cover anyway.
 
WOW ! Never thougt about airial fire retardent being the end of a organic farm ! We need to get back to tending nature with lots of controll burning like the native californians did for 10,000 + years . HARD ON NESTING BIRDS AND NOT THE SAME EFFECTS SINCE THE INTRODUCTION OF NON NATIVE INVASIVE PLANTS BUT HARD TO BEAT WITH HAND WORK ?
 
Yes, they are awesome, have attended lots of their presentations. The difficulty with avocados ( our main crop) is that they are not well understood by people growing other crops. You don't want to have anything else growing under them, because they have a large feeder root network. It extends throughout the grove. "Cover cropping" in the traditional way cannot be done in the root zone without harming the avocado trees. Most cover cropping systems that I have seen rely on deciduous tree cycles which are different than sub tropical trees. Subtropical trees do not really have a "dormant" season so you can't mow and dig around their roots like you can with deciduous trees or crops that come and go. We have seen damage in our grove from some perennial cover so we have been moving away from that. We use the seed bank plants as a base and try to add to that. We have to keep them away from the avocado tree roots. Deep and heavy mulch might be the only solution at the moment. We lack the water to be able to effectively grow any cover anyway.

I Do not relish the agronomic decisions that you face at this time!
For the cover crop, I was thinking more permanent living mulch than cover crop. I gathered you could not mow or cultivate.
But it sounds like most things are moot until you can keep the fruit from blowing out of the trees.
I have notice on some trees of ours when we deep mulch, like 8-12 inches the roots of the trees grow into the mulch and lock it in place.
This may not be logistically possible depending on the acerage.
 
I’m not a commercial grower and I can’t grow avocado trees where I’m at, so take this with a grain of salt. But the research by Dr. James White is very interesting. He has found that it is the microbiology that makes roots go down, without sufficient microbiology roots can be aerial and grow straight out. Avocados because of their nature may always have aerial roots, but I wonder if increasing the microbiology and the depth of it in your soil in time would help to draw some of those roots down to anchor the tree more in place?

For that to happen, you would definitely need to not have bare soil. The winds were intense, but wood chips do seem to stay in place. Instead of using it for cover cropping, dutch white clover may be an interesting companion crop. I used it in my pots this last year as a green mulch because it is a smaller clover. Granted, it did affect my need to water and so I won’t be using it for pots again. But growing in pots is much different from growing in ground and it depends on your set up with what you have already going on.
 
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