Spotted Wing Drosophila
A small vinegar fly whose female can saw into fruit that is still ripening instead of waiting for it to rot. Berries look perfect in the basket and go soft and leaky a day later.
Pest checklist
Four things to look for. If most of them match what you are holding, you are in the right place.
What gets rid of them
Gentlest option first. For most backyard cases the first one is enough, so try these in order and stop as soon as it works. If you do spray something, the product label tells you how — please read the notice further down.
1Pick clean and pick often
Harvest every one to two days and strip off every overripe, split or leftover berry, because those are the breeding sites.
Try this first2Chill the fruit right away
Refrigerate berries as soon as you pick them. Cold stops the larvae from developing in the fruit.
3Bag the culls in the sun
Seal culled and infested fruit in a clear plastic bag and leave it in full sun instead of tossing it on the compost pile.
4Fine insect netting
Cover bushes or rows with fine insect mesh before the fruit colors. Ordinary bird netting has holes far too big to stop a fly.
fine mesh insect netting garden5Spray options if you grow for sale
Spinosad and pyrethrin products are the home-scale choices. Spray in the evening to spare bees and rotate chemical classes as the label directs.
spinosad concentrate garden
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Which plants get spotted wing drosophila
Every plant we cover that gets spotted wing drosophila, grouped by type — tap any one to open its page. A note beside a plant came from that plant’s own entry, because the same pest can be a minor nuisance on one plant and a serious problem on another. Plenty of plants we do not cover get it too.
shrubs4
perennial1
Plant families hit hardest
Related plants often share the same problems, so if one plant in a family has it, check the others. The largest group here is Rosaceae, with 5 of the 8 affected plants.
- Rosaceae5 plants
When to treat
Preventive, not treat-on-sight. This fly is established across Missouri, so once fruit starts to color assume it is present. Waiting until you find maggots means that fruit is already lost.
Timing only — the label is the law
This page tells you when to watch for spotted wing drosophila and when treating is worth considering. It is not a recommendation to apply any particular product. Read and follow the product label before you spray — under federal law the label is the legal instruction, and using a pesticide against it is illegal.
- Check the pre-harvest interval. Every product that’s cleared for an edible crop sets a minimum number of days between spraying and picking. Find it on the label before you spray anything you intend to eat.
- Check the re-entry interval before you or anyone else works in the treated area again, and use the protective equipment the label names.
- Confirm the product is registered for your crop in your state. This page groups many different crops together, and a product legal on one of them is not legal on all of them — state registrations differ too. Your state pesticide agency or local extension office can confirm both.
- Rates and mixing instructions come from the label, never from us. We don’t publish them because they differ by product and formulation.
Other problems on the same plants
If a plant gets spotted wing drosophila, these are the problems it most often gets as well, so they are worth checking for while you are out there. They tend to appear together; one does not cause another.