Cherry fruit fly: how to recognise and treat it

Pest

Cherry fruit fly — Photo: Holger Krisp, CC BY 4.0, Wikimedia Commons

Symptoms

A brownish, soft patch on the cherry near the stalk.
A white legless maggot 4–6 mm long inside, turning the flesh into a soft rotten mass.
Small exit holes in the skin close to the stalk.
Only the fruit is damaged; leaves and shoots stay healthy.

Organic treatment

Harvest early and completely, and remove infested and fallen fruit from the garden.
Hang yellow sticky traps in the canopy; in a home garden mass trapping can be the main control.
Spray the fungus Beauveria bassiana on the foliage while the flies are active.

Chemical treatment

Azadirachtin or a pyrethroid timed by the first flies on yellow traps; follow the label dose and pre-harvest interval.

Reference information, not a guarantee. Read and follow the label of any product: dose, safety and the days to wait before harvest.

Prevention

Cover the tree with 1.3 mm insect netting from the start of the fly flight until harvest.
Lay fine netting on the soil under the tree to stop flies emerging from the pupae.
Choose early-ripening varieties, which are attacked less.
Dig the soil under the tree in autumn or spring to destroy the overwintering pupae.

Plants it affects

Sources

Figures checked against these sources.