International Journal of Horticulture, 2024, Vol.14, No.3, 127-134 http://hortherbpublisher.com/index.php/ijh 128 fruits while B. cucurbitae (nowZeugodacus cucurbitae) mainly attacks vegetables like Cucurbits (Bhowmik et al., 2014). In Nepal, seventeen species of fruit flies have been reported by Entomological Division, Nepal Agriculture Research Council namely B. dorsalis, B. zonata, B. correcta, B. cucurbitae, B. tau, B. scutellaris, B. diversus, B. caudatus, B. minax, B. yashimoto, Dacus longicornis, B. nigrofemoralis, B. latifrons, B. artifacts, B. tuberculate, Dacus ciliates, and B.minax (Adhikari et al., 2020). Fruit flies in Nepal mainly attack Cucurbit fruits (79%), fruits (14%), and solanaceous fruits (6%) (Adhikari et al., 2018). China has listed fruit flies as quarantine pests as per the bilateral trade protocol signed with Nepal (Sharma et al., 2015). Farmers have practiced different ways like burying the dropped fruits, composting and feeding the larvae of fruitflies to chickens, and even spraying pesticides (Acharya and Adhikari, 2019). The efforts made still seemed not enough to control the infestation. However, the fruit flies have been controlled to some extent using protein bait sprays in agricultural areas in Hawaii trapping with baited lures (Ugwu, 2019). Fruit fly management is performed through mass trapping and food-based lures in Nigeria. Mass trapping has proved to be effective in fruitfly control along with a cost-effective approach (Ugwu, 2019). Therefore, the study's objective was to evaluate the efficacies of two commercial and four homemade food baits in trapping and managing the fruitfly species in mandarin orchards in Syangja. 1 Materials and Methods 1.1 Research site The experiment was conducted from Feb to June 2022 in three different farms at closed locations of Mandarin Farmers Group. All were located in Nepal’s mid-hill region with a subtropical climate at a latitude of 28°4'60 N, longitude of 83°52'0 E, and an elevation of 1,281 m. The average annual minimum and maximum temperature range reported during the research period were 9.6 °C-18.4 °C. The average precipitation of the study site was recorded to be 235.3 mm and the humidity of 58%.The local locations were selected due to the abundance of farmers in the area growing mandarins. Thus, the baits can be used to monitor, monitor, and manage fruit flies to assess the efficacy of different trapping lures (baits). 1.2 Research design The experiment design followed was a Randomized Complete Block Design (RCBD). Three locations were used as three replications and eight different baits as treatments (Table 1). The treatments were aligned from east to west using a compass. The baits/lures were hung at crop height (where fruiting occurs) using iron wires. The distance between each bait from east to west was 10 m to avoid mixing intermixing of volatiles generated by such traps (Mesquita et al., 2018). Such spacing allowed the fruit flies to choose their favorite bait for feeding where they got knocked out after feeding on Malathion-poisoned baits. Table 1 The layout of the proposed field for research (With arrangement of treatments and replication) R1 R2 R3 T1 T5 T3 T3 T7 T5 T6 T2 T7 T2 T6 T1 T5 T4 T4 T7 T1 T2 T4 T8 T6 T8 T3 T8 1.3 Treatments Seven treatments were prepared which comprise 2 commercial lures, Cue Lure, and Methyl Eugenol Lure (Table 2). The remaining five were prepared from home-based products and the other treatment was control. All the
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