Insecticides Maintain High Quality of Colombian Coffee

Damage begins after a female bores a hole in the berry and builds a gallery in the seed where eggs are deposited. After hatching, the larvae start consuming the seed [1]. Feeding by adults and larvae can turn the bean into a dusty mass of frass, but even lightly bored beans have a distinctive blue-green staining which lowers quality. The galleries allow pathogens to enter, leading to fermentation and tainting of coffee flavor. Because of the quality requirements of the specialty crop label, an important consideration is the need to maintain <2% insect damage [3].