Wednesday, June 25, 2008
Carica Papaya (bis)
The papaya, Carica Papaya L., is a member of the small family Caricaceae allied to the Passifloraceae. As a dual- or multi-purpose, early-bearing, space-conserving, herbaceous crop, it is widely acclaimed, despite its susceptibility to natural enemies which here in Miami mainly consist of the wasp-like papaya fruit flies, Toxotrypana Curvicauda which rhymes with "a real nuisance." The female deposits eggs in the fruit which will later be found infested with the larvae. This also is the problem that infects my guavas. Only thick-fleshed fruits are safe from this enemy. One remedy is to cover each fruit with a plastic bag, also a major pain in the neck, literally! I know, I do it for my "award winning" guavas, buy not for the papaya, because I don't like this fruit at all. Never ate them, and never will... wait a minute, I do eat this in the delicious green papaya salad ... I take it back! I will start to bag these too.
Your right about the papaya fruit and it can damage a mango. But the guava is different. It looks much like a fly. The Caribbean fruit fly, Anastrepha suspensa (Loew), has also been called the Greater Antilliean fruit fly, the guava fruit fly and the Caribfly.
ReplyDeleteTrue for the difference between the papaya and guava being affected by different flies... but I never knew mangoes are attacked too. Really? I never saw a problem in Miami, and Miami is full of mangoes all summer long...
ReplyDeleteWhat attracted me to this picture was that this relatively small papaya tree has such a big fruit ... ^_^ nice picture.
ReplyDeleteGreetings from Bandung.