Diversity of coleopteran fauna in kharif pulses from three different locations of Southern Rajasthan

Abstract

An investigation on “Diversity of coleopteran fauna in kharif pulses” were carried out at the Department of Entomology, RCA, MPUAT, Udaipur, during the kharif season 2015 with a view to record the species diversity of coleopteran fauna in kharif pulses viz., blackgram greengram and cowpea at three locations (College Instructional farm, Farmer’s field at Vallabhnagar and Farmer’s field at Badgaon village). The conducted survey resulted in the collection of members of 8 coleopteran families (2 foliage feeding: Curculionidae and Chrysomelidae, 3 flowers and pods feeding: Scarabaeidae, Bruchidae and Meloidae and other families: Coccinellidae, Staphylinidae and Anthicidae). Based on relative density the curculionids and chrysomelids were dominant in pulse crops. The location-wise and as per crop Shannon diversity indices ranged from1.72 to 1.54 and maximum for the fauna in greengram at the farmer’s field of Vallabhnagar (1.72) and lowest for fauna in blackgram at farmer’s field of Badgaon (1.54).