The Berry Patch: Small Local Farm Invents New Way to Exclude Major Pest
Ask your nearest berry farmer what the bane of their existence looks like these days and they’ll tell you it’s an ugly little fruit fly called the Spotted Wing Drosophila.
An infestation of the insects, which hail from Southeast Asia, hit the Berkshires and Hudson Valley in 2012, claiming 40% of Dale Ila Riggs's blueberry crop. Riggs has run The Berry Patch in Stephentown, New York with her husband Don Miles for 25 years. The farm, just across the border from Hancock, Massachusetts, has prolific berry yields, a robust pick-your-own program, and a quaint farm store that’s an established community staple. The Spotted Wing put all that in jeopardy.
Unlike other fruit flies, it was not enough for the little buggers to eat her blueberries. The Spotted Wing lay their eggs in them as well, rendering huge amounts of fruit inedible. Though she had always been low or no-spray at the small farm, Riggs found herself walking the fields, spraying low-impact insecticide six nights a week. She said she just couldn’t live that way.
Berry Patch Owners Dale Ila Riggs and Don Miles
At the time, along with running the farm and store, Riggs was also the president of the New York State Berry Growers Association and was well tuned in to the scientific discussions surrounding the insects’ growing impact. In 2013 Cornell entomologists had grown a crop of blueberries under fine netting. The tests weren’t perfect but showed promise. Too many Spotted Wings were still getting in.
“I said of course you can't stop them from going in and out without good anchors,” said Riggs.
Riggs was already using a much more open weave of net for bird exclusion. She realized that if you ran a baseboard to secure the netting flush to the ground and instituted a two-door entry, like a clean room, it would greatly reduce the amount of Spotted Wings able to get in.
Riggs secured a United States Department of Agriculture grant to conduct her own tests on the farm with infrastructure and procedural help from Cornell Cooperative Extension Small Fruit Specialist Laura McDermott and University of Vermont Agricultural Engineer Chris Callahan.
The following year, 2014, with a new plan, her infestation rate fell to 0.67% and now they haven’t found a single infested berry in years, while keeping the entire farm 90% pesticide free.
“The thing about the netting is it is so unique,” said Riggs. “We’ve made history in agriculture. It’s really the first time we’ve brought an invasive pest under control so quickly.”
Riggs said the Berry Patch proscribes to a style of farming called “protective culture." They grow all their other produce in unheated high tunnel greenhouses. So being more protective of the berries seemed like a no-brainer.
“I have a very creative brain and Spotted Wings do not. I’m not going to let a little bug with no brain outsmart me,” Riggs said.
That first year they compared two different netting sizes. Unsurprisingly, smaller holes were better. Cornell Cooperative Extension evaluated data weekly.
“The key to my system that I did from the start was the double-door entry,” Riggs said. “After introducing the vestibule, we improved every aspect of the system; different anchors for wind, better connections, adding baseboards. I incorporated the same lock-and-channel connections we used as fasteners for the greenhouse plastic.”
Riggs said that as she was developing the technology she was always thinking about what was realistically available to other small-scale growers. She shared that information with manufacturers as well. She worked with Tek-Knit Industries in Montreal to put cross-stitching every quarter inch in the netting so a small rip wouldn’t run like a nylon stocking. She also got them to put zippers at the edges of the panels to make for easy installation and takedown.
Riggs received another USDA grant in 2020 to look at standardizing the frame structure for use by other farmers. She tried both a metal and wood system. Both were successful, providing options to farmers who adopt the netting. For the frames Riggs worked with Gin-Tec out of Ontario, which primarily makes shade structures for the ginseng farming industry.
“People are really starting to pay attention to our results,” Riggs said. “For small-scale farmers like me, if people don’t want to be spraying every week, this is the only other option."
Moving forward, Riggs said she’d like to see agriculture agencies offer cost-sharing programs to berry farmers interested in implementing the system. While the system costs around $15,000, that is the amount she was able to recoup in one year in product saved on a half acre. Riggs said there are currently 8 to 10 growers using the system and she believes that number will grow once the results of early adopters become known.
“I have not patented the design,” Riggs said. “I am not in the part of my life where making a lot of money is my priority but I do want recognition. This is agricultural history.”
The Berry Patch
15589 NY-22, Stephentown, NY
(518) 733-1234
Store open Friday-Sunday, 10 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.
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