Fruit flies (Diptera: Tephritidae) are notorious pests of horticultural crops, causing significant economic losses especially in the tropics. Controlling fruit flies relies on an integrated approach through application of a variety of techniques including fruit bagging, field sanitation, use of host plant resistant varieties and soft insecticides. Additional eco-friendly options involve the use of traps baited with protein and semiochemical lures; however, this approach targets mainly males. To target females requires exploitation of their host marking behavior. Ovipositing females of certain fruit fly species use to mark their oviposition sites with a host marking pheromone (HMP), to deter other females from overexploiting these sites. This suggests that HMPs if identified can be exploited for the control of females. Previous work has identified HMPs for ovipositing females of the cherry fruit fly, Rhagoletis cerasi and the Mexican fruit fly Anastraphe ludens. However, few are known for African indigenous fruit flies. This presentation will highlight the identification of the ubiquitous antioxidant tripeptide glutathione and amino acid glutamic acid as HMPs for the economically important African indigenous fruit fly species, Ceratitis coysra, and C. rosa and C. fasciventris, respectively and their implications for use in their management.

Development of host marking pheromones for the control of fruit flies in Africa: The icipe experience

256th National Meeting (2018)

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