Efficacy of food-based attractants for monitoring Drosophila suzukii (Diptera: Drosophilidae) in berry crops

Spotted-Wing Drosophila (SWD), Drosophila suzukii Matsumura is an invasive fruit fly pest of soft-skinned fruits that causes serious economic losses in the berry growing areas of central Mexico. Effective attractants are necessary to detect its presence, to monitor populations where established, and to explore new strategies for pest control. The capture of D. suzukii in four food-based attractants was compared with apple cider vinegar (ACV) as the reference attractant in blackberry, raspberry, and blueberry crops. An active yeast-based lure, Fly Buster Powder (R), resulted the most effective attractant capturing SWD flies in blackberry and blueberry. However, this attractant was similar to SuzukiiTrap (R) Max Captures, ACV and Pherocon (R) SWD, but less effective than a twocomponent attractant (2C trap) in raspberry. The specificity of attractants was variable among crops and experiments but Fly Buster Powder (R) tends to be highly selective in the capture of SWD with up to 70% of D. suzukii from all drosophilids captured. Fly Buster Powder (R) and 2C trap attractants were more effective trapping D. suzukii when aged for 7 days than when aged for 1 or 15 days. The specificity of both yeast-based attractants was significantly reduced when aged for 15 days than when aged for 1 or 7 days.

Automated summary

The study compared the effectiveness of different attractants in capturing Spotted-Wing Drosophila, finding that the yeast-based Fly Buster Powder (R) was the most effective attractant for SWD in blackberry and blueberry crops, but not as effective in raspberry as the two-component attractant (2C trap). The specificity of attractants varied among crops and experiments, with Fly Buster Powder (R) showing a tendency to be highly selective in capturing SWD.