Abstract

Castor, Ricinus communis Linn, is an important non-edible oilseed crop, widely grown under rainfed conditions. In Tamil Nadu, the castor hybrid, TMVCH 1 and TMV 6 are widely grown as pure crop during kharif in districts viz., Salem, Erode, Namakkal and Dharmapuri due to their high seed and oil yield and heavy demand for castor oil in many industries. Castor crop cultivation has attained a momentum to become as a cash crop and intensive cultivation with hybrid castor TMVCH 1 has picked up under irrigated and rainfed conditions in Tamil Nadu. Castor cultivation is constrained by more than 60 insect pests through out the crop period (Rai, 1976) resulted in heavy yield loss. Among them the castor capsule borer, Dichocrocis punctiferalis and the leaf eating caterpillars, especially, the semilooper, Achaea janata, tobacco caterpillar, Spodoptera litura, the occasional pest slug caterpillar, Parasa lepida and jassids are causing a considerable damage and reducing the yield (Lakshminarayana and Raoof, 2005). Extensive survey and monitoring of pest incidence on castor throughout the crop period over several years is essential to know the seasonal occurrence of castor pests, their peak incidence, nature of damage, and occurrence of natural enemies. These informations are useful to find the vulnerable stage of the pest for taking control measures and to formulate the effective management practices. Hence, the present study was conducted to make survey and to monitor the incidence of major pests of castor

Keywords: Ricinus communis, Kharif