Discovery of second fruit fly in Auckland is not unexpected this time of year, expert says

A discovery of a second fruit fly in Auckland is not unexpected this time of year, authorities have said.

A second fruit fly was discovered in Otara in South Auckland late on Monday after a Queensland fruit fly was found on the North Shore last week.

Dr Cath Duthie of the Ministry of Primary Industries said it was the first time the fly, which is native to Tonga, had been found in a surveillance trap.

"What I do want to emphasis, this is part of our standard biosecurity surveillance, it’s not unexpected at this time of year as the minister (of agriculture and biosecurity Damian O’Connor) mentioned," she said.

"Particularly with volume of trade and travel we have in NZ which is exactly why we have this level of surveillance."

Dr Duthie repeated that this species of fly was less of a threat than the Queensland fruit fly because it needed warm weather to breed.

"This is actually much less of a threat than the Queensland fruit fly, it has a much more limited host range, and additionally, it needs higher temperatures to reproduce," she said.

"So, it’s highly likely that even if we did have an established population here in terms of a breeding population, the temperatures would be too low for survival."

Staff would be split between Devonport and Otara with the activities at both essentially the same.

"We’ll have more than 60 staff on the ground, we will split our time between Devonport and Otara because the activities are essentially the same."

Activities initially focused on making sure residents in the 200m zone were aware of the discovery with staff to now work on installing traps in the 1.5km zone provided there are suitable trees to place the traps in.

Dr Duthie said Otara market would go ahead as normal on Saturday.

"There will be a large number of uniformed staff at Otara market, the market will go ahead as normal, there is no concern with the market,"  she said.

A food pantry in Otara that falls within the 200m radius of where the fly was found, has been closed and temporarily removed as a result of the fruit fly response.