author(s)
NK Berani, MP Damor and PH Godhani

abstract
A field experiment was carried out to study the incidence of major lepidopteran insect pests of the black gram on different dates of sowing at B A College of Agriculture, Anand Agricultural University, Anand, with five different sowing dates at an interval of seven days. The result showed that there was a significant impact of sowing periods on insect pests activity in black gram. The incidence of defoliators viz., Bihar hairy caterpillar, Spilosoma obliqua Walker and Spotted pod borer, Maruca testulalis (Geyer) was higher in the late sowing periods i.e., 1^st week of August and 2^nd week of August. These sowing periods also yielded higher. The prevalence of defoliators was comparatively low in 2^nd week of July, 3^rd week of July, and 4^th week of July sown crop.