Their use monitors adult activity to determine the need and timing for control treatments. The blueberry maggot has no important natural enemies. Cultural practices of weed suppression and burning the fields every second or third year helps to reduce maggot populations, but in most areas insecticides are necessary. Leaftiers are most abundant on wild, abandoned, or poorly managed blueberry land. Outbreaks, however, occur occasionally on improved blueberry fields and in areas where the plants are mowed for pruning purposes.
Crop damage can be extensive because of the invasion of larvae into the flower buds in early spring.
Insecticide treatments may be required to prevent crop losses. Leaftier numbers are generally at low levels in fields that are burned every 2 years. The blueberry leaftier overwinters in the egg stage as a partly developed larva in the egg case. Late-instar larvae move about freely and leaves are often webbed and rolled together. The larvae pupate during June either in leaves spun together or hanging freely by the cremaster attached to any part of the plants.