What's eating my olive 'arbequina'?

Arbequina olive shares all common olive pests but is grown commercially at high density, making olive fruit fly management especially critical for this oil variety. In the UK and cooler climates, fruit fly pressure is lower, but scale insects and the olive moth can still cause significant economic loss. Fruit fly is the definitive worst threat wherever it is present.

Larvae bore through the pulp of Arbequina olives before harvest; oil acidity spikes, flavour turns rancid; fruit drops prematurely; losses can reach 80% in warm wet seasons Deploy attract-and-kill traps across the canopy; apply spinosad bait sprays; harvest early in the season before populations peak; maintain trap monitoring from midsummer

Flat, dark domed scales on young stems; honeydew leads to sooty mould that reduces photosynthesis; severe infestations cause shoot dieback Apply horticultural oil when crawlers emerge in late spring; increase canopy airflow through pruning; introduce parasitic wasps (Metaphycus spp.) for biological control

Flower generation destroys blossoms and reduces fruit set; fruit generation bores into young olives and causes them to fall before maturity Apply Bt (Bacillus thuringiensis) at petal fall to target young flower-generation larvae; monitor with pheromone traps to time applications precisely