The trial came about following the enforced eradication of recreational and commercial beehives around Coffs Harbour late last year, to contain the deadly parasite.

Berries Australia executive director Rachel Mackenzie said the effect of varroa mite was varied.

Some raspberry and blackberry crops had failed, while other growers experienced a drop in berry quality and an increase in pollination costs.

Ms Mackenzie said the situation had led to a partnership between Berries Australia and horticulture research body Hort Innovation to expand its national fly pollinators project to the Coffs Coast.

"This concept for the project has come at a time when growers are realising that they can't be entirely reliant on European honey bees and that it's a good idea to look at other options," Ms Mackenzie said.

"Isn't it better to be utilising a native species than an introduced species to do this important work?

"I think it's that classic thing of diversifying your risk."

Flies get 'bad rap', researcher says:

Like a honey bee, the hover fly (Eristalis tenax) feeds on flowers and when it processes pollen and nectar it is capable of pollination.

In Coffs Harbour, the research will be led by the University of New England and seedPurity.

It aims to understand how the hover fly pollinates on berry farms in the varroa mite red surveillance zones.

The trial will also assess how growers could use native flies as alternatives to honey bees.

Professor Cameron Spurr, from seedPurity, said getting Coffs Coast growers past stereotypes about flies had been crucial.

"Flies get quite a bad rap. Most people think of flies as a pest, and there are certainly pest flies," he said. 

"But there are a lot of flies that provide good services.

"When we explain the types of flies we are going to use and what we want to do, people are very interested to be involved."

Promising results on blackberry farms in Tasmania are one of the reasons Professor Spurr is confident about the upcoming Coffs Harbour pilot.

"We already know [the hover fly is] present in Coffs and we already know from our work with it that it's a good pollinator," he said.

Need for alternative pollinators:

Professor Spurr said testing alternative pollinators in varroa mite surveillance zones was an important step in the broader project.

"We are significantly at risk because we over-rely [on European honey bees]," he said.

"So this is a really unique opportunity to have a look at what some of these alternative pollinator species can really do in a system where we are now really restricted with what we can do with honey bees."

He said there was no need for beekeepers and apiarists to be concerned about competition between European honey bees and hover flies. 

"[The hover fly is] there to pollinate the target crop for a short period of time, so we don't see any pollination issues," he said.

The Coffs Harbour trial is expected to start in April and run over three years.

Original Story By | Claudia Jambor