Florida y es de importancia cuarentenaria. With this information bait spray experiments and regular treatments can then be scheduled to avoid periods when flies are not active. For most other fruit fly species this information is not available. The purpose of this study was to develop temperature thresholds for A. suspensa through controlled laboratory studies with colony reared insects and then confirm these results with wild flies. Specifically, this research determined a cold torpor threshold and a flight threshold for A. suspensa.
Studies are in progress to determine an oviposition threshold and a feeding threshold.
The adult flies used in this experiment were from a colony reared on artificial media in the laboratory in Miami, FL, and were 5 to 7 days old. Paper with a 2 cm grid was placed on one side of the petri dish to allow fly movement to be measured. The petri dish was held vertically by a small c-clamp. A tele-thermometer used to measure the temperature was calibrated with a National Standards Traceable mercury thermometer. The incubator was equipped with fluorescent lights that were positioned directly over the petri dish at a distance of 10 cm.