A semi-synthetic chickpea flour based diet for long-term maintenance of laboratory culture of helicoverpa armigera

Chitti babu, B and Sharma, H C and Madhumati, T and Raghavaiah, G and Krishna murthy, K V M and Rao, V S (2014) A semi-synthetic chickpea flour based diet for long-term maintenance of laboratory culture of helicoverpa armigera. Indian Journal of Entomology, 76 (4). pp. 336-340. ISSN 0367-8288

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Abstract

Artificial rearing of insects in the laboratory is a pre-requisite for undertaking studies on insecticide/ biopesticide bioassays, and evaluation of germplasm, segregating breeding material, mapping populations, and transgenic plants for resistance to insects. For successful rearing of insects in the laboratory, there is need for standardizing a semi-synthetic diet that supports survival and development of the insect for several generations. We tested different semi-‘synthetic diets for rearing the legume pod borer, Helicoverpa armigera for two generations under laboratory conditions. All the semi-synthetic diets tested supported the growth and development of H. armigera up to adult emergence, but there were significant differences in survival and development and fecundity on different diets. The highest larval survival was observed in the wheatgerm based diet in first (97.5%) and second generation (93.5%), followed by chickpea based modified diet (93.75% survival in both the generations). The lowest larval weights (270.7 and 283.7 mg) were recorded in the tapioca granules diet in 1st and 2nd generation, respectively. The adult emergence ranged from 68.7 to 83.3%, and 60.4 to 81.2% in the 1st and 2nd generation, respectively. Least fecundity was observed in the tapioca granules based diet (422 and 603 eggs per female) in both the generations, but the differences were not significant. Complete or partial replacement of agar-agar with tapioca granules was not suitable for use in artificial diets. The results indicated that modified chickpea flour based diet was quite appropriate for rearing H. armigera under laboratory conditions

Item Type:	Article
Divisions:	RP-Dryland Cereals
CRP:	CGIAR Research Program on Dryland Cereals
Uncontrolled Keywords:	Insect rearing, Artificial diets, Tapioca granules, Helicoverpa armigera, Survival and development, Fecundity
Subjects:	Mandate crops > Chickpea
Depositing User:	Mr T L Gautham
Date Deposited:	08 Jan 2015 08:44
Last Modified:	08 Jan 2015 08:44
URI:	http://oar.icrisat.org/id/eprint/8458
Official URL:
Projects:	UNSPECIFIED
Funders:	UNSPECIFIED
Acknowledgement:	UNSPECIFIED
Links:	Google Scholar

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