Table of Contents
Eggplant is a plant with very pests and diseases and is relatively easy to grow and care for. However, the rainy season is a favorable time for Eggplant fruit and shoot borer to attack, greatly affecting the yield and quality of the fruit. Read on below from Garden How to learn more about the type of pest and get rid of it effectively.
Characteristics of Eggplant Fruit and Shoot Borer
Scientific name: Leucinodes orbanalis
The adult is a butterfly, with a body length of 13-14mm, and white wings, with brown and pink spots on the wings.
Butterflies lay eggs in clusters on the undersides of leaves, flower buds, and young fruit. One female can lay up to several dozen eggs. Eggs are milky white, flattened, and arranged in the shape of roof tiles.
Young caterpillars are ivory-white, then turn pale pink, pushing their strength from 15-18mm. Also, the pupa is brown. On average, their cycle life of them lasts 30-40 days, and the growth time of larvae is 15-20 days.
Butterflies often hide under grass and leaves during the day and are active at night. Not only the fruit is affected by the pests, but also the young shoots are attacked. They bore into the top and cause the top to wilt.
For the fruit, the caterpillar bores inward and leaves a small hole. If the fruit is damaged, the intestines will be empty because the worm has eaten all the flesh. The inside of the fruit is filled with worm droppings, causing partial or complete damage to the fruit.
Many times, the young caterpillars also drill into the fruit stalks, making the fruit unable to grow or wilt. When it rains, the damaged fruit is easy to rot because the hole contaminates with microorganisms.
The caterpillar pupates in the damaged fruit or stem or hides in the fallen leaves. In the rainy season, the damage is most severe, especially in periods of heavy rain with high air humidity.
How to prevent Eggplant Fruit and Shoot Borer?
Cultivation method
Visiting the field daily, timely detecting young branches and fruit pests are removed to destroy the worms in the fruit to limit the spread of worms.
Periodically clean the eggplant field for ventilation, and remove weeds around the field to prevent butterflies from laying eggs.
Using natural enemies
In nature, eggplant borers have natural enemies to attack such as: parasitic wasps, washing bugs, aphids Orius sp, net beetles, fungi Metarhizium anisopliae, and NPV viruses,…
It is necessary to create conditions for these natural enemies to develop to reduce the number of pests and protect the field.
How to control Eggplant Fruit and Shoot Borer?
You can spray insecticides for Eggplant Fruit and Shoot Borer needs to be carried out early, the most suitable time is when detecting adults or eggs or at the latest when the newly hatched caterpillars have not yet entered the fruit. If spraying late, when the worms get into the fruit, then your spray is not effective.
Besides, you can use the following drugs to spray: NPPV virus preparations, Bioncin 16WP, Map-Biti, Success 25SC herbal medicine group, or Vineem 1500EC. Eggplant Fruit and Shoot Borer are pests with high resistance to pesticides, so it is necessary to alternately use the drugs.
Eggplant is also a fruit that is harvested continuously, so be very careful when spraying, and choose less toxic drugs with a short isolation time. It is better to use drugs to the “4 rights” principle. Absolutely comply with enough isolation time to keep the sprayers safe and consumers’ health.
Final Thoughts
Eggplant is large, Eggplant Fruit and Shoot Borer cannot attack the whole but only partially. However, the worm attacks inside very neatly, so it is necessary to have a control measure form before they get into the fruit to be effective. So, we hope this information can be helpful for you in growing Eggplants. For more insightful details about other flowers and vegetables, let’s visit our gardenhow.net!
Related posts:
How to grow Eggplant?
How to grow Eggplant in pots?