Studies on seasonal incidence of plume moth, Sphenarchus caffer Zeller in Dolichos Bean, Lablab purpureus L. and its relation with abiotic factors

Abstract

The present study was carried out to find the correlation between the seasonal incidence of plume moth, Sphenarches caffer with weather variables during kharif 2015-16 and kharif 2016-17 respectively. The results revealed that the standard week wise data pertaining to plume moth S. caffer population during kharif 2015-16 revealed that the highest population incidence was recorded with two peaks i.e., once at 47th standard week and second one at 49th standard week with 3.0 and 3.3 larvae per plant, respectively, while during kharif 2016-17 the highest population incidence of S. caffer was observed with two peaks i.e. once at 49th standard week and second one at 50th standard week with 2.8 and 3.7 larvae per plant, respectively. The observations on the relationship between plume moth, S. caffer larval population with preceding one week (one week lag) weather parameters during kharif 2015-16 revealed that there was a significant negative correlation with maximum temperature (-0.427*) and evaporation (-0.517*) at 5 % level of significance whereas significant positive correlation with evening relative humidity (0.074*) at 5 % level of significance. During kharif 2016-17 minimum temperature (-0.293*) and evaporation (-0.676**) were negatively significant with S. caffer larval population at 5% level and 1% level of significance, respectively while evening relative humidity (0.186*) was positively significant at 5 % level of significance.