The dried-fruit beetle / Carpophilus hemipterus

The dried fruit beetles, are a worldwide pest of fruits and grains. Dried fruit beetles attack a wide variety of hosts including stone fruit, persimmons, fallen citrus, apples and figs. Adult dried-fruit beetle can cause feeding damage on ripening stone fruit and is a vector of the fungal disease brown rot. Harmful to provisions and hygiene, it can be found in supermarkets, grocery stores and warehouses. It attacks various varieties of dried fruits, such as peaches, greens, plums, figs, dates, etc., on which they also lay their eggs. Attacking other provisions such as cereals, corn, dried plants, nuts and other dried products is possible only in the case of mature beetles. Such provisions and food are suitable as an egg-laying substrate only if there is sufficient moisture. But in food stores, where nuts are found, these pests usually find optimal conditions for multiplication. The larvae that have hatched eat the fruit, leaving behind galleries, which they fill with a crumbly mixture of excrement and food scraps. Excrement is found in microorganisms (bacteria, fungi), which are responsible for the relatively rapid deterioration of infested fruits.

Most commercial feeding damage is done to ripening stone fruit. Stone fruit can be attacked on the tree, beetles burrow into the fruit.  They also enter through splits and mechanical damage. In other fruits such as citrus, apples and figs, only fallen fruit is attacked.

The dried-fruit beetle beetles are a major vector of brown rot.  As they crawl through damaged fruit, the spores of brown rot stick to their bodies and are spread through the tree canopy and from orchard to orchard. The disease is carried on the body of the insect and fruit can become infected with the disease simply by contact, without the beetle actually feeding on fruit. Control of иууеду, where they are present, is an important part of controlling brown rot.

Biology 

Adult beetle are small at around 3mm long.  They can be black, brown or mottled yellow. Larvae are yellowish with a brown head and are about 5mm long. It takes about a month in summer to develop from egg to adults so there are many generations per year.

Eggs are laid singly, on ripe or fermenting fruit, in the field or in stored-products. Eggs take 1-4 days to hatch. Larval development is completed in 4-14 days. Pupation usually takes place in soil in field populations, but in stored-products, pupation takes place within the infested commodity. In warm areas or within heated buildings, breeding is continuous and there are several generations per year. Pupation occurs after a prepupal period of 3-8 days, and adults emerge 4-16 days later. Thus, the development cycle is about 12 days at warm temperatures (32.2°C) and up to 42 days at cooler temperatures (18.3°C). When temperatures are too low for breeding, the beetles hibernate as mature larvae, pupae or adults in the soil, stored commodity, or fruit left on the ground. Though adults can live for more than a year, dried fruit beetle males generally live 146 days while females average 103 days. 

Female dried fruit beetles can lay over 2,134 eggs at 28.1°C, however the average is 1,071 eggs in her lifetime. 

Humidity is very important to the survival of dried fruit beetles. Low humidity is unsuitable for dried fruit beetle larval development and oviposition. 

The dried fruit beetle can be found in a wide variety of ripe and decomposing fruit in the field and is a serious pest of dried fruit. The dried fruit beetle can also be found on stored corn, cornmeal, wheat, oats, rice, beans, nuts, peanuts, cottonseed, copra, spices, drugs, bread, sugar, and honey. 

Solution

Purpose: to monitor and reduce pest numbers. (Mass capturing)     

It is recommended to place traps on plants: at a distance of 40-50 m between them.

Mass capturing – from 20 traps per ha.

Severe impairment – from 30 traps per ha.

The traps must be checked every 5-7 days. Pheromone dispenser’s efficiency is for 4-6 weeks in opened field and adhesive tapes can be replaced when it is full with pests and dust. For barns pheromone dispenser is available from 6 to 8 weeks and quantity traps depends on placement dimensions. Protective measures are based on the results of the monitoring of population density of pest insects.