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#forcipomyia

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Sarah Arnold<p>A brief <a href="https://beige.party/tags/Introduction" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Introduction</span></a> or actually, re-introduction post. </p><p>I'm Sarah. I'm an entomologist. I work at Niab in the UK, studying insects important in fruit crop production. This includes <a href="https://beige.party/tags/Pollinators" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Pollinators</span></a> like bees and hoverflies, as well as natural enemies of pests, and the pests themselves.</p><p>Most of my work is on UK crops like <a href="https://beige.party/tags/Apples" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Apples</span></a> and <a href="https://beige.party/tags/Strawberries" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Strawberries</span></a> but I also have an area of work on entomology in <a href="https://beige.party/tags/Cocoa" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Cocoa</span></a> (there are a lot of parallels with orchards really!).</p><p>I'm always happy to infodump enthusiastically about <a href="https://beige.party/tags/SolitaryBees" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>SolitaryBees</span></a>, <a href="https://beige.party/tags/Forcipomyia" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Forcipomyia</span></a>, <a href="https://beige.party/tags/Cacao" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Cacao</span></a> cultivation, <a href="https://beige.party/tags/Strawberry" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Strawberry</span></a> varieties, and also about hamsters.</p>
Sarah Arnold<p>Cocoa is especially <a href="https://sciencemastodon.com/tags/pollinated" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>pollinated</span></a> by <a href="https://sciencemastodon.com/tags/Ceratopogonidae" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Ceratopogonidae</span></a> midges, particularly the genus <a href="https://sciencemastodon.com/tags/Forcipomyia" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Forcipomyia</span></a>. However...lots of other insects of similar size may play a role. This could include thrips, gall midges, fruit flies, etc. Gall midges are particularly common on cocoa plantations.</p><p>But Forcipomyia respond to the odour of <a href="https://sciencemastodon.com/tags/cocoa" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>cocoa</span></a> flowers, and have hairy bodies that cocoa pollen clings to, so they can carry more grains than many other flower visitors. So it's likely that they're most efficient.</p>
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