Mango farmer traps fruit flies with plastic

CHEAP SOLUTION: Mworia finds a way to rake in cash while protecting his neighbours’ harvest

BY HARRISON AGUNDO

A section of innovative mango farmers in the country are using low-cost plastic bottles as traps to fight the notorious fruit flies responsible for over 60 per cent of fruit losses.

The cheap baiting solution has seen them record a significant drop in insect-infested harvests and helped them cut down on pesticide use, which has traditionally taken a toll on fruit quality and their pockets. For as little as Sh90, a farmer can make or access a trap that can capture over 50,000 flies within two weeks.

Sticky sugar

All one needs is a plastic bottle, pierced with small holes on the sides. Inside the bottle, a small cotton or cloth ball is soaked with female fruit fly hormone or liquids like sticky sugar or vinegar that will lure the male fruit fly population.

The males fly in through the small holes in the bottle and are killed by pesticides in the lower part of the bottle. By reducing the male population in this way, farmers have managed to get a handle on fruit fly populations.

Daniel Mworia, a mango farmer in Tala, eastern Kenya, knows too well what this biological method means for his half-acre orchard.

Having tried all conventional pesticides to no avail, he had decided to give up mango farming.

“I have been involved in mango farming for the last 10-years. At no other time has the effect of fruit flies been more devastating than last year when I lost over 80 per cent of my yield. It’s still painful to remember,” Mworia says.

But this would be a blessing in disguise.

An old friend coming back from employment in Senegal, where the biological control method has been perfected, returned to find Mworia in the process of cutting down his mango trees.

“He asked me what was wrong and I explained to him. It really touched him and he vowed to help me. That is how I learnt about using bottles as traps. Everything turned around from then,” he recalls.

Converting skeptics

Mworia converted some skeptical friends, and the method spread rapidly. He trains fruit farmers to use the traps and also makes them for farmers who do not have the time to do so themselves.

The prices range from Sh90 to Sh600 based on how large they are and what liquid has been put inside. “Cereal farming has been really disappointing in this area, so when we realised how lucrative fruit farming is, we all delved into it. We, therefore, cannot take anything for granted,” said Mworia.

Fruit flies can wipe out an entire orchard within days.

A female fly pierces a mango and lays eggs in the ripening fruit. In two to four days, the eggs hatch, releasing maggots that cause the fruit to rot and fall to the ground.

Once the infested mango falls, the larvae bury themselves in the soil to mature and then emerge to restart the destructive cycle.

“The idea here is if the farmers can hit these flies before their numbers increase, they are in a safer position than waiting for the fruit to ripen because by then nothing can stop the fertile egg-laying females from attacking the fruit,” says Lucas Wanderi from the Africa Alternative Pest Control Group(AAPCG), a body that trains farmers in baiting fruit flies.

— FarmbizAfrica