Seasonal occurrence and diversity of arthropods in Bt cotton ecosystem under Akola conditions of Maharashtra
AA Shinde, SM Dadmal, ND Gajbe and VA Mane
Present investigation was carried out at Department of Entomology, Dr. PDKV Akola (MS) India during kharif 2016. It is revealed from the survey that, Bt cotton ecosystem harbored total 22 insect fauna out of which 14 insects were categorized as pests and 8 were natural enemies (NEs), besides eight species of predatory spiders were recorded. In Bt cotton ecosystem whiteflies, leafhoppers, aphids, mite, thrips, red cotton bugs were found in abundance during 34th, 35th, 36th SMW. Whereas, natural enemies viz; spiders, lady bird beetles, mallada, syrphid fly, ant and chrysopa were found predominantly during 35th, 36th, 37th and 38th SMW. The simple correlation studies indicated that rainfall had a significantly negative correlation with semilooper, whitefly, leafhopper population. However, positive significant association was noticed between maximum relative humidity with fruit borer, ash weevil, syrphid fly, white flies, chafer beetle and spider population. High percent abundance was recorded by aphids followed by leaf hoppers, whiteflies, mites, thrips and red cotton bugs with moderate to rich biodiversity of arthropod fauna was noticed in Bt cotton (H'= 2.193) crop ecosystem at Akola.
AA Shinde, SM Dadmal, ND Gajbe, VA Mane. Seasonal occurrence and diversity of arthropods in Bt cotton ecosystem under Akola conditions of Maharashtra. J Entomol Zool Stud 2017;5(5):1614-1619.