The Blackheaded Caterpillar of Coconut (Nephantis serinopa) Biological Control through utilisation of its Natüral Enemies - Eulophids

Abstract

Chalcid Ichneumonid, Tachinid fly and Eulophid. It is possible by utilising these parasites to control this pest of coconut trees hy introducing the parasites in areas where they are not found now and by breeding and multiplying some of the parasites in the laboratory and liberating them against the pest for strengthening the ranks of its enemies in nature. For the latter purpose, it is only those that are suitable for laboratory rearing that can be taken up. Amongst the natural enemies of Nephantis serinopa that can be bred and multiplied in the laboratory, Eulophid (Trichospilus pupivora) is important on account of (1) its suitability to laboratory rearing (2) its adaptability to alternate hosts like Plubia, Sylepta, Prodenia, etc., when Nephantis scrinopa pupe become scarce in the area and cannot be easily collected; the short duration of the life-cycle enables a large number of generations to be reared in the year: (4) its high fecundity; (5) its capacity to spread to considerable distances when released in nature on account of its active habits; (6) absence of any natural enemies of its own; (7) very high rate of as much as 50% parasitisation of the pest pupe.

DOI

https://doi.org/10.29321/MAJ.10.A04392

Pages

15 - 17

Creative Commons

Copyright

© The Author(s), 2025. Published by Madras Agricultural Students' Union in Madras Agricultural Journal (MAJ). This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited by the user.

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