The Queensland fruit fly

Unlike the small fruit flies that we usually in the fruit trees, this Queensland fruit fly is big and it looks more like a wasp than a fruit fly. That is why it took me so long before I was able to identify what was harming the star fruits in our garden.

The QFF (Queensland Fruit Fly) has a stinger at the bottom like a wasp but it is not to sting. What it does is to bore a hole on the fruit to deposit its egg. One egg buried in the star fruit will cause a dot on the fruit. Sometimes there would be 10 eggs so that makes for 10 dots on the fruit which cannot be eaten anymore. The QFF is a pesky pest.