Efficacy of Bio-Intensive integrated pest management against brinjal shoot and fruit borer Leucinides orbonalis (Lepidoptera: Crambidae)

Abstract

Brinjal (Solanum melongena) plays a vital role in the food of South-Asian people, thus the production of brinjal in these countries is quite high. However the production of brinjal does not satisfy the whole demand of people owing to the severe infestation by L. orbonalis. In order to get maximum yield from the cultivation farmers rely on over and indiscriminate use of chemical insecticides. Due to the side effects of over and indiscriminate use of toxic insecticides, now the trend moves towards Bio-intensive Integrated Pest Management (BIPM). The present study conducted to find the efficacy of BIPM over farmer’s practices and untreated control in controlling the L. orbonalis. The study evidenced the superiority of BIPM in all aspects viz., lesser shoot infestation (15.82 percent), greatest yield (17,170.22 kg/ha) and higher natural enemies activities (5.25 no./10plants), which was equivalent to untreated control. Besides the treatment BIPM proved its efficacy over farmer’s practice and untreated control especially with high percent increase of yield (63.90%), percent reduction of shoot (64.01%) and fruit infestation (80.58%), and less percent reduction of natural enemies’ population (8.70%). Apart from this the benefit cost ratio (BCR) ranked in the order of superiority as BIPM module (1:5.75), which was greater than the farmer practice (1:4.96) on brinjal.