Sampling Adults with Visual Attraction Traps, Sound Traps and Other Miscellaneous Attraction Traps

Abstract

Visual attraction traps are so efficient in catching tsetse flies that they are sometimes used as a control method. Tsetse entomologists have found that trap colour is a vital component of the attractiveness of these traps. Green and Flint (1986) have analysed the effects of colour on trap performance and their paper is of value to mosquito workers because it describes how reflectivity and wavelengths are measured for different coloured materials, and describes the differences between various spectral reflective curves. Agee and Patterson (1983) present a useful paper on the measurement of spectral sensitivity of muscoid flies and measurements of spectral reflectance, including UV light from different potential trap surfaces. Brach and Trimble (1985) give some useful graphs on the spectral reflectance of traps painted with different enamel paints and five fluorescent Day-Glo paints. They found that Tangle-Trap adhesive either decreased or increased reflectance from fluorescent coloured traps, and it appears that this adhesive acts as a barrier reducing the amount of incident UV radiation absorbed by the fluorescent pigment.