Codling moth (apple and pear maggot)
Cydia pomonella
Role in the garden
Small moth whose pinkish caterpillar bores a tunnel to the pips of apples, pears and sometimes walnuts: it is the “maggot” of maggoty fruit, the number-one pest of apple orchards.
Activity period
Flights from May to September (two generations, three in the south)
How to attract / manage it
Nets, pheromone traps to spot the flights, corrugated-cardboard trap bands, picking up fallen fruit, tits and bats.
Practical guide
Where to find them
Garden and orchard apple and pear trees, quince, walnut (a form of the codling moth specific to walnuts). The caterpillar enters through the eye or the side of the fruit and leaves a hole plugged with brown frass.
Prevention
Put up nest boxes for tits (great consumers of caterpillars) and let bats hunt above the orchard, in June wrap corrugated-cardboard bands around the trunks, where the caterpillars go to pupate (to be burnt in autumn), bag the fruit on small trees, pick up prematurely fallen fruit every week and dispose of it.
Early signs
A small hole in the fruit with brown frass (droppings) spilling out, often near the eye; premature drop of young fruit in June; a brown tunnel to the pips when cut open.
Action / control
A pheromone trap to date the flight, then, if you can find it, a granulosis-virus treatment (Cydia pomonella granulovirus, used in organic farming; the garden versions have become rare in garden centres) in the days following hatching; a fine-mesh insect net on small trees; mating disruption is reserved for orchards. Affected fruit can be eaten once the damaged part is removed.
Sources
- INRAE, Ephytia : Pomme, Cydia pomonella (carpocapse) et VigiJardin, Carpocapse du pommier
- RHS : Codling moth (rhs.org.uk)
- Jardiner Autrement (SNHF) : carpocapse, guide d'observation des bioagresseurs au jardin
Favourite plants / resources
Related plant entries
Apple tree
A pivotal tree in the permaculture orchard, the apple occupies the upper storey and forms the backbone of a whole guild layered beneath it (Hemenway, Gaia's Garden). Its blossom benefits from being surrounded by nectar-rich companions (borage, phacelia) that feed bees and bumblebees. At its feet, comfrey provides a potassium-rich mulch biomass, white clover fixes nitrogen as a living ground cover, while garlic and tansy play the traditional role of repellent aromatics. So encircled, it structures a small ecosystem that tends towards self-reliance: covered soil, pollinators on hand and organic matter renewed on the spot.
Pear tree
A high layer (4-6 m on quince, 8-12 m on seedling rootstock). CROSS-pollination obligatory: plant 2 compatible varieties. Lives 50-80 years. Tansy at its foot reputed to keep away certain pests (popular reputation, moderate effect). Comfrey in the low layer = potassium-rich mulch. Keep away from junipers (Juniperus, especially J. sabina): obligate alternate host of pear trellis rust, Gymnosporangium sabinae (RHS; PNW Pest Management Handbooks).
Walnut
Under its broad crown, better to grow plants with little sensitivity to juglone.
Quince tree
A small, hardy, unpretentious tree, with a beautiful pink spring flowering (nectar-bearing) and a very fragrant golden fruit, turned into jelly, paste (cotignac), or compote, never eaten raw. Self-fertile and modest in size, it finds its place in small orchards; it also serves as a classic dwarfing rootstock for the pear.