One fruit fly can lay a few hundred eggs during her life. Fruit flies puncture the skin of fruit to lay their eggs, which cause the fruit to drop prematurely and rot. The worms that hatch from these eggs leave the spoilt fruit after one week and crawl into the soil where they develop into fruit flies. From one infested fruit many fruit flies can develop, so never leave any fruit on the ground in the open air.

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Fruit flies inject their eggs in fruit. A single fruit fly can lay hundreds of eggs, which turn into white worms that eat the inside of fruit. If no action is taken, fruit flies quickly increase in numbers and can destroy your entire crop. Always combine different methods: • Place traps; • Use food baits; • Encourage weaver ants; and • Collect and destroy any fallen fruit.

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Onions grow well under many different conditions, but when grown in the rainy season onions have a greater chance of getting sick. Onion diseases can make the leaves fold and reduce your yield. Diseases can spread with soil, seed or infested crop residues.

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Onions have few roots and shallow roots and therefore can take up nutrients from the top soil only. This explains why it is crucial to pay particular attention to making your soil fertile when you want to grow onions.

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Onions need rich, fertile soil. Only grow onions once in 3 years in the same field. Plant the onions on raised beds, especially in the rainy season. Transplant when the onions are about 6 weeks old. Plant the onions 10 centimetres apart. By taking good care of your onions, the onions will take good care of you.

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Onion seedlings need a healthy, loose soil. Add well-aged manure or compost. In the rainy season you need to raise the seedbed so the onion roots will not rot. If you use quality seed, most of the seed will germinate and you need much less of it. Onion seedlings need room to grow, so do not plant them too close together. Put the seed in lines, 5 to 10 centimetres apart and 1 centimetre deep. Cover the seeds lightly with fine soil.

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Let us learn from the experiences of some innovative farmers in Ghana who make more money: by producing onions when there are few of them on the market; by storing them until the price comes up again; and by selling directly to clients in urban markets.

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Modern dairy plants use pure, fresh milk to make milk powder, cheese, yoghurt and other products. The processing plant can only make its products from pure milk. When water is added, the milk is diluted, or weakened, and it is not good for processing into dairy products.

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Antibiotics are drugs used for killing germs. The drugs can be given by mouth or injected into the animal’s muscle or vein. These drugs go directly into the bloodstream. The blood carries the drug to the udder where it will get into the milk.

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Ticks are small creatures like insects that attach to the body of animals to suck their blood. Ticks cause diseases like skin lesions. The animals will become skinny and no longer produce milk.

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