Study on susceptiblity of several varieties of olive trees to olive fruit fly, Bactrocera oleae (Dip.: Tephritidae)

Olive fruit fly, Bactrocera oleae Rossi, is a key pest of olive on olive-growing areas in the world including, Iran. This monophagous pest was reported in 2004 in olive-growing areas of North of Iran, causing serious damage. Its damage results in reduction of yield quality and quantity. Deployment of resistant varieties and detecting resistance mechanisms can be useful in management programms of this pest. As treditional farmers do not apply cultural or chemical methods to control this pest, deploying resistant varieties will be more acceptable by farmers. In this research, 10 promising olive varieties in Roudbar Olive Research Station (Guilan province) were studied in order to determine the infestation rate of olive fruit fly and chemical compounds of olive drupes (‘Arbequina’, ‘Manzanilla’, ‘Leccino’, ‘Zard’, ‘ Konservalia’, ‘Amigdalifolia’, ‘Kalamata’, ‘Roghani’, ‘ Mari’ and ‘Fishomi’). ‘Arbequina’ and ‘Kalamata’ varieties can be considered in developing olive varieties, due to low rate of yearly infestation (8 to 11%). There was no correlation between infestation rate and either morphological traits and chemical compounds in olive oil. However, oleuropein can be considered as one of the resistance factors to olive fruit fly.