North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[John S <swim_at_svc@yahoo.com>]

Fruit eating wasps are a big problem for me.  I have watched the wasps slowly chew a hole in the side of a small fruit, such as a gooseberry, then calmly eat the interior of the fruit.  If the wasp is disturbed, they will frequently not be able to find their way back to the fruit with a hole, but land on another and chew another hole.  Once there is a hole in the fruit, flies show up and continue the feeding process.  I lost most of my gooseberry crop last year to this process.  This year, I have been trapping and fighting them, so have had better access to the fruit for harvest, but the amount of damage is still significant, maybe 50%.

Next year I will be covering with cloth and fiberglass screen (mix to let light in but let me see the crop without uncovering) as the damage always appears to happen before the fruit is fully ripe.

By the way, this is the same kind of wasp that pollinates my yellow raspberries.  I would not  mind sharing but they are too destructive and greedy.

John



--- On Mon, 7/21/08, Alan Haigh <alandhaigh@gmail.com> wrote:

From: Alan Haigh <alandhaigh@gmail.com>
Subject: [NAFEX] wasps
To: nafex@lists.ibiblio.org
Date: Monday, July 21, 2008, 5:18 AM

Jeez, Rivka, I said I was joking.  If I can be Elmer Fudd can't I imagine you as Snowhite?  Anyway it amazes me that your wasps never become a problem with damaging fruit as it is quite common here.  They have even sucked the juice out of grapes protected by nylon stocking.  I know the difference between bird damage and wasp damage and wasps are often more destructive here only they don't fly away when you approach the tree.  This doesn't mean that I attempt to eliminate wasps from my property, but in a bad year when there is a population explosian and yellow jackets seem to be swarming my entire property and guests won't even stand outside I will attempt to reduce the population.

 

Maybe if I gentally relocated their nests they'd return the kindness and stop chewing holes in my fruit and maintain reasonable population control.

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