Doctoral Student Builds 'Better Flytrap'

Who would have thought a device used to help pizza boxes keep their shape would become a useful scientific tool?

Entomology department doctoral candidate Robert Puckett used his knowledge of the phorid fly to make a trap out of a pizza tent that came out of a pizza box. The tents, or tri-stands, are used in pizza delivery boxes to keep the tops from caving in on the pizzas.

Puckett knew that the flies, which are natural enemies of the red imported fire ant, like to perch on a plant or a blade of grass while waiting for a fire ant that it can attack.

Puckett's traps use the natural "trash" that fire ants leave, called fire ant midden, as the bait. The midden is composed of fire ant carcasses and attracts the flies to the trap.

The ant carcasses in the midden have a chemical called kairomones that attract the flies. The chemical is usually released when the mound has been disturbed. The flies then become attracted to this chemical and are trapped on one of the glue-covered posts.

Puckett tried different types of traps, which included small vials coated with glue. The previous traps were not effective enough at catching the very small insect.

Puckett found that, when turned upside down, the tent's three prongs and solid base were perfect for the job. The trap is then coated the prongs with a glue-like substance similar to coating used in fly paper and placed in the small plate of midden.

The pizza tent traps are inexpensive and are more efficient in collecting flies than with past methods. This allows Puckett to place a trap anywhere and find them with the aid of a global positioning system, or GPS, receiver. He can recover the traps within 24 hours.

Puckett is studying the fly's habitat, expansion corridors, and the parasite-host interaction between the flies and fire ants as part of his doctoral research.

The tracking of these flies is very important because the U.S. Department of Agriculture and researchers at Texas A&M and University of Texas, and elsewhere, are releasing phorids to test them as a potential biological control against the red imported fire ant

The flies are imported from South America.

Dr. Sanford Porter with the USDA Agricultural Research Service in Gainesville, Fla. and Dr. Larry Gilbert with the University of Texas collaborated with Puckett on this project. Puckett's work is funded by the USDA Agricultural Research Service.