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Angela5237
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- Joined: Tue Jun 26, 2012 7:43 pm
- Location: Long Island, NY
Hot Pepper Plant Bug
My cherry peppers were looking so great until I picked one off and opened it up to find brown, mushy goo. To make it worse, a little white larvae looking thing squirmed out of it. I then picked off another pepper which wasn't ready yet and to my surprise, another white larvae. This went on for six or so hot peppers. What's going on?!
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rainbowgardener
- Super Green Thumb
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- Location: TN/GA 7b
I think you have pepper maggots.
Scroll down in this article until you get to pepper maggot fly:
https://extension.umass.edu/vegetable/a ... per-maggot
apparently they particularly love cherry peppers to the point where they can be used as a trap crop to protect your bell peppers. Not much help for you!
They are another one of those really pesky things that are difficult to deal with (like ths squash vine borers) because the eggs are laid directly inside the pepper, so you never see them. Although the article talks about insecticides, it seems like insecticides would only work on the adult fly if you see her and spray her directly. Nothing sprayed on the outside of the pepper will affect the larva inside.
My best suggestion is grow your peppers under row cover. But this only helps if it is up BEFORE the fly lays her eggs in your peppers.
Bad news for all the rest of us - the range of this pest is spreading!
Scroll down in this article until you get to pepper maggot fly:
https://extension.umass.edu/vegetable/a ... per-maggot
apparently they particularly love cherry peppers to the point where they can be used as a trap crop to protect your bell peppers. Not much help for you!
They are another one of those really pesky things that are difficult to deal with (like ths squash vine borers) because the eggs are laid directly inside the pepper, so you never see them. Although the article talks about insecticides, it seems like insecticides would only work on the adult fly if you see her and spray her directly. Nothing sprayed on the outside of the pepper will affect the larva inside.
My best suggestion is grow your peppers under row cover. But this only helps if it is up BEFORE the fly lays her eggs in your peppers.
Bad news for all the rest of us - the range of this pest is spreading!
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Angela5237
- Full Member
- Posts: 20
- Joined: Tue Jun 26, 2012 7:43 pm
- Location: Long Island, NY
I think you are right..Funny thing is, I have been seeing the fly (bright yellow, with green eyes) for a majority of the summer and I couldn't figure out what it was. I attached a picture of it that I took a few weeks ago when I was trying to ID it. Now it's going to send me into panic mode because the cherry peppers are near my sweet peppers!
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JC's Garden
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- Location: Moultrie, GA Planting Zone 8, Sunset Zone 31
I had them in early July. They were in my Thai peppers. I could see a tiny sting at the base of the peppers and an exit hole about 3/16", midway up. I found one with a sting and no exit hole. There was a pepper maggot inside.rainbowgardener wrote:I think you have pepper maggots.
Bad news for all the rest of us - the range of this pest is spreading!
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Angela5237
- Full Member
- Posts: 20
- Joined: Tue Jun 26, 2012 7:43 pm
- Location: Long Island, NY
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rainbowgardener
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- Joined: Sun Feb 15, 2009 6:04 pm
- Location: TN/GA 7b