FRUITSPOTTING BUG
This pest is a native sap-sucker and often attacks orchard trees close to bushland.
Suggested Organic Strategies:
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Careful re-design is needed to increase diversity, often there is a lack of understorey in the nearby bush, which would normally be a habitat for natural predators of the bug. A thick planting of native shrubs between the bush and the orchard, or around the orchard boundary will create niches for longer-lived predators of bugs such as birds, spiders, assassin bugs, tachinid flies, chalcid wasps and ground beetles. The shrubs also act as a physical barrier to flying insects.
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Cover cropped orchards support more soil dwelling predators and generally have a lower number of pests than bare or grassed orchards.
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Improve the habitat for birds by providing safe nest sites, food and water.
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Poultry may also help, so keep either chooks, guinea fowl or ducks as they all eat large numbers of insects. Guinea fowl are a lot more feral than chooks, roost in trees at night and may be better at catching flying insects like the Fruitspotting bug.
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Small ponds encourage useful predators of insects such as frogs and dragonflies, which need water to breed.
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To encourage beneficial insects, it is important to avoid the use of pesticides wherever possible.
Suggested Products:
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