What are the latest bugs appearing in cherries?
Cherries are one of people's favorite fruits, but a message that went viral on the internet has left many people uneasy: a netizen soaked bought cherries in salt water, and half an hour later, many small worm-like creatures resembling “maggots” appeared on the surface of the cherries, making them look very unpleasant. Let's take a look together below at what these cherry bugs actually are!
Is it true that cherries have bugs?
Cherries do have bugs. A reporter specifically conducted a set of experiments for this: cherries randomly bought from a fruit stand had surface dirt removed, then were soaked separately in cups of warm boiled water and salt water. Half an hour later, the cherries soaked in warm boiled water showed nothing unusual. But in the cherries soaked in salt water, three small white worms were found, only the size of a thread end, the length of a ballpoint pen tip, and resembling maggots. Although it is a fact that cherries contain small worms, it is not as exaggerated as the online claim of “9 out of 10”.
What are cherry bugs?
Cherry bugs are fruit fly larvae. According to Director Wang Jin, who is in charge of the cherry research group at the Fruit Tree Research Institute of the Chongqing Academy of Agricultural Sciences, these small white worms inside cherries are larvae hatched from fruit fly eggs laid inside the cherries. Fruits that give off fragrance, such as waxberry, strawberry, kiwi, grape, pear and banana, are the favorites of fruit flies.
Can cherry bugs really be eaten?
Cherry bugs can be eaten. Fruit fly larvae are different from the “maggots” in our usual impression. They are relatively close to flies, but they are not flies. They are a type of fly that lives on ripe fruit and can appear on all kinds of ripe fruits. Fruit flies parasitize inside plant fruits and only move around on fruit. From birth to growth, the larvae stay in an unpolluted environment and rarely carry pathogens. Therefore, they do not harm animals, let alone humans. On the contrary, fruit flies are rich in protein and beneficial to health. Moreover, cherries that can soak out worms are precisely those that have not used pesticides, so they can be eaten with confidence. Of course, eating bugs will after all make people feel “rather uncomfortable”. If you want to taste the deliciousness “without worries”, the best method is still to soak fruits such as cherries and waxberry in salt water.
Extended reading: Fruit flies
Fruit flies are widely distributed in temperate and tropical climate zones around the world. Because their main food is yeast, and rotting fruit easily breeds yeast, their traces can be seen in human habitats such as orchards and vegetable markets. Apart from the North and South Poles, at least more than 1000 fruit fly species have been discovered so far. Most species feed on rotting fruit or plant matter, while a small number feed only on fungi, tree sap or pollen. At the same time, as a eukaryotic multicellular insect, the fruit fly has physiological functions and metabolic systems similar to mammals. It is very sensitive to air quality, and abnormal behavior can reflect indoor air pollution.