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Experiment Background
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Sorghum
Sorghum crop is grown all over the world and is a staple food and fodder crop in India. Among cereals, sorghum is the fourth most important crop after rice, wheat and maize in India. The major sorghum growing areas are in the states of Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Gujarat, Tamil Nadu and Rajasthan. Near about 150 insect species have been reported as pests on
sorghum, of which sorghum shoot fly (Atherigona soccata) and stem borers (Chilo partellus) are the major pests worldwide. During storage, different species of insect pests such as Sitophilus granarius (L.), Sitophilus oryzae (L.), Sitophilus zeamais (Motsch.), Rhyzopertha dominica (F.), Oryzaephilus surinamensis (L.), Trogoderma granarium (Ev.), Tribolium castaneum (Herbst), Sitotroga cerealella (Oliv.) and Cryptolestes ferrugineus (Stephens) were observed to cause serious damage to sorghum. The insect pests were reported to cause up to 13.12% weight loss of threshed sorghum and 8.34% weight loss to the unthreshed sorghum.
Pigeonpea
Pigeonpea (Cajanascajan (L.) Millsp.) is a principle crop grown for its protein-enriched seed in the Indian subcontinent. In India more than 150 insects have been reported on Pigeonpea crop. Pod borer, Helicoverpa armigera (Hubner) and pod fly, Melanagromyza btusa Malloch (Agromyzidae: Diptera) are the major pests of pigeonpea. Pests of various species cause havoc on storage grains, resulting in both qualitative and quantitative grain losses. Insect pests feed stored grains and reduce the weight, nutritional content and germination of these grains. Major insect pests of stored grains include lesser grain borer (Rhyzopertha dominica), rice weevil (Sitophilus oryzae), Khapra beetle (Trogoderma granarium), rust red flour beetle (Tribolium castaneum), long headed flour beetle (Latheticus oryzae), saw toothed beetle (Oryzaephilus surinamensis), rice moth (Corcyra cephalonica), almond moth (Cadra cautella), Angoumois grain moth (Sitotroga cerealella), pulse beetles (Callosobruchus chinensis, C. maculates, C. analis). Insect-related losses have been estimated to be between 5 and 10%, with up to 30% in the tropics (Ahmad et al., 2021). Therefore, the present study will be proposed to find out the effectiveness of Entomopathogens and inert dust against major storage insect-pests damaging seeds and to study of the storability of treated seeds.
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