This year as my figs are getting ready to ripen, they all seem to fall off the tree. I’ve noticed there is some sort of bug boring inside and I assume this is the reason they are dropping.
Can anyone help identify this bug? Is this a common issue and do you have any preventative suggestions? Any help is appreciated.
I have never heard of this problem before. Nor do I have any clue of what it could be.
Yeah, seems strange. They look similar to the borers I’ve found in the trunk of my apple trees and plums, but there are probably a lot of larvae stage bugs that look similar.
Can’t tell from the images. You would have to determine if the larva has only 3 pairs of legs near the head end (beetle) or more than 3 pairs of legs distributed down the body length (moth or other).
Doing some quick google searching makes me think it may be black fig fly. I’ll have to do some more research.
Fly larvae do not have jointed legs, but will have little bumps or knobs on the underside, running the full length of the body. Moth larvae will have several pairs of jointed legs, 3 pairs up front, then a gap, them one (inchworms) or more (other moths) pairs behind.
I realize this is not a great photo, but I am not seeing any jointed legs. I need to get a magnifying glass.
Flipping it over would help more than the magnifying glass. Refrigerate for a while and it will not wriggle upright when flipped. It looks too shiny for a caterpillar, more likely it is a fly larvae.
^ check out this fig pest thread.
