I didn’t know that the Medfly is very particular about citrus fruits. They only lay their eggs on unblemished citrus fruits. So aside from taking out the citruses that would remain unused from the tree, be sure to puncture them before composting them or throwing into the garbage if you don’t want to use them. Puncturing the fruits would prevent the medfly from laying their eggs and then multiplying.
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Either that or you could splurge and spend $12 on a pint of Spinosad and treat your trees a few times a year, thus eliminating your garden as a source of nuisance pests.
Many folks would be turned off by applying spinosad especially if they need to buy it.
Spinosad is a BROAD SPECTRUM INSECTICIDE. Just because it is organic, it doesn’t mean it is ecologically safe.
It is indeed safe for humans and mammals but because it is a broad spectrum insecticide, it is not for the other beneficial insects such as mantids, ladybugs, lacewings, assassin bugs, syrphid flies, honeybees… so only use it when it’s beyond economic threshold.
I love to not apply anything by maintaining a good balance and diversity of insects both predator and prey, that way, I don’t need to be forever spraying for insects.
Spinosad is tested to be nontoxic to humans, rats and other mammals but highly toxic to honeybees and slightly toxic to fish.
in rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss Walbaum, 1792), LC50-96h = 30.0 mg/l (slightly toxic)
in Honeybee (Apis mellifera Linnaeus, 1758), LD50 = 0.0025 mg/bee (highly toxic if directly sprayed on, little toxicity of dried residues).
That’s why the directions on the bottle encourage you to apply towards the evening when the bees have gone home. After application it is inert in 8 hours. So yes, you shouldn’t pour it in a stream – but also it’s nothing to get hysterical about.
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