Abstract

Efficacy of entomopathogens for control of blue pumpkin beetle (Aulacophora nigripennis motschulsky, 1857) in sponge gourd ( Luffa cylindrica) under laboratory condition at Paklihawa, Nepal

S.S. Bhattarai, S. Koirala Bishwokarma, S. Gurung, P. Dhami& Y. Bishwokarma

With the objective of studying the efficacy of entomopathogens for the control of blue pumpkin beetle in sponge gourd, a lab experiment was conducted from 2015/10/1 to 2015/10/12 at the entomology lab of Institute of Agriculture and Animal Science (IAAS), Paklihawa, Rupandehi. The design of the setup used was completely randomised design (CRD) with four treatments along with control and five replications. Three entomopathogens were used in experiment among them two were fungi; Metarrhizium anisopliae, Beauveria bassiana, while Bacillus thuringiensis was bacteria. Singly treated leaves of different size were kept in each 20 boxes which were changed on third day after first placement and later continued at 2 days interval. Eight beetles per box were kept to know the mortality by different treatments. Amongst all, Beauveria bassiana recorded the highest mean mortality (4.4), followed by Bacillus thuringiensis (4) and Metarrhizium anisopliae (3.3) as against 0.6 in control. Taking day, treatment and mortality as the parameter, Beauveria bassiana was found to have significant difference over Metarrhizium anisopliae and Control but insignificant over Bacillus thuringiensis. The order of efficacy was ranked as; Beauvaria bassiana>Bacillus thuringiensis>Metarrhizium anisopliae> Control

Published Date: 2016-10-03;