Olive flies

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bbobandannie
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Olive flies

Postby bbobandannie » Tue Oct 11, 2016 6:07 pm

Our first month here has been blighted by the huge amount of flies around our house. The house is in the campo, surrounded by olive groves. Initially there was a fair amount of flies and after trying all the organic solutions such as planting herbs and hanging bags of water with coins inside we eventually opted for the killer paint option. It has fly sex attractant and a contact poison. This seemed to have a noticeable reduction in the fly population and we were hopeful that long term we could reduce the breeding adults, with the possibility of a more comfortable summer next year. However there has been another population explosion and even though our killer paint (Agit is the brand name) continues to kill them, the numbers are overwhelming and sitting outside is difficult. The recent explosion could be down to neighbours spreading manure on the nearby allotments but the end result is us being locked inside during the afternoon.
Does anyone have any suggestions, particularly interested in the best recipe for fly traps. I think the largest number of our pests could be olive flies,though I don't suppose that would be effected by the use of manure.

olive
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Re: Olive flies

Postby olive » Tue Oct 11, 2016 7:30 pm

Just out of interest what do these "olive Flies" look like?

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knowal
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Re: Olive flies

Postby knowal » Tue Oct 11, 2016 9:15 pm

In all my years in Spain I never heard of olive flies, Olive! :)

Gasman
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Re: Olive flies

Postby Gasman » Tue Oct 11, 2016 10:11 pm

Mosca de Oliva, or olive flies, seem to be related to the Mediterranean fruit flies that make such a mess of apricots and peaches. On the olives, perhaps a smaller version of fruit fly, makes at least one pinprick on each olive and unless sprayed to prevent this, or at least to kill the eggs before they produce larvae, the olive oil can be quite bitter, and if you are pickling the olives, they have nasty blemishes on them.
They are by no means the same as house flies, or horse-flies, or the sort you get with manure .... we need to see a photo of bbob's infestation ...

olive
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Re: Olive flies

Postby olive » Tue Oct 11, 2016 10:19 pm

Indeed.

They are also the first insectto be genetically modified so they are infertile. It costs a fortune to sprayagainst them and theirconsequent damage.

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knowal
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Re: Olive flies

Postby knowal » Tue Oct 11, 2016 11:18 pm

Oh, these:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olive_fruit_fly
Never had an infestation of them during 17 years of olive tree owning and farming. Judging by the damage, I'm pleased about that!

bbobandannie
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Re: Olive flies

Postby bbobandannie » Wed Oct 12, 2016 7:19 am

Sounds like they can't be olive flies then, as I guess the locals would be all over it, due to the dependancy on the crop. So, same question but for fruit flies. They actually look like your average house fly but I'm no expert. The increase though, did coincide with local manure spreading.

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Enrique
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Re: Olive flies

Postby Enrique » Wed Oct 12, 2016 7:50 am

Good morning bbobandannie,
It maybe just a bad year for you, a good year for the flies.......we had one some years back and had to use a Mosquito net to sit outside.
That year we had the water bags hanging, but the best of all was the hanging drinks bottles with a little smelly fish in the bottom, positioned around the edges of the sitting area.
We only had the one bad year but I'm guessing if you have allotments close and the locals are using animal manure its something you will have to live with.

"They actually look like your average house fly but I'm no expert".........so your Post title should just have read "Troublesome Flies," the Olive Fruit Fly already has enough bad Press................. :shock:

PS: Hanging sticky fly strips work well too...can be bought from Droguería.
All my best learning experiences start with a problem I need to solve.

bbobandannie
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Re: Olive flies

Postby bbobandannie » Wed Oct 12, 2016 1:15 pm

Enrique, fingers crossed you are correct and we have just been unlucky this year. That aside, did the smelly fish work as good bait in the bottle?

Gasman
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Re: Olive flies

Postby Gasman » Sun Oct 16, 2016 12:57 pm

Both the olive fruit fly and the Mediterranean fruit fly are distinguished from the house fly and than nasty biting slightly smaller common fly, by the way their wings tend to stick out from the body when at rest (or dead!!) and are very transparent with a brown blob near the centre of the wing. The "normal" flies keep their wings tucked in near the body at rest and do not have the brown blob on the wings.
Dimethoate in spring, repeated after 15 days, and again when the air cools (a little) in Sept/Oct, kills off the larvae before they do too much damage in the olives.

telboy
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Re: Olive flies

Postby telboy » Wed Nov 16, 2016 8:07 pm

Maybe it has something to do with living near the lakes near Ardales. We recently did the Caminito del Rey ending up at the El Mirador restaurant at about 3pm it was sunny and mild we sat outside initially but moved inside where the flies(a lot of them) were less of a problem. I must admit we've never seen so many flies since holidaying in Crete years ago were at the time there was 3 week refuse collectors strike!!

We ourselves live in the campo near Iznajar lake and are surrounded by olive trees, flies seemed to be just slightly more of a problem this year, but I guess this is due to the milder weather we are experiencing just now, as soon as it gets cooler the flies will disappear and of course this will trigger the beginning of the Metanzas (Pig Killing).

If your problem is Olive flies then surely the local farmers will be spraying the crops to combat this, I know they do around here. Just slightly moving off topic this year we had less of an issue with wasps but more of a problem with horseflies which only seem to abundant around May time.

Good Luck

terry


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