Evaluation of different food plants and Feeding Preference of Chrysocoris stolli Wolf (Heteroptera –Pentatomidae –Scutelleridae)

Abstract

Insecta is the largest class of phylum arthropods and members of this class are characterized by the presence of three pairs of legs; hence, called Hexapods, Besides, these tracheae organisms have usually one or two pairs of wings. Insects always have been associated with mankind in one way or the other as some of them are beneficial other are pests of crops and house hold articles. Chrysocoris stolli Wolf (Heteroptera- Pentatomidae-Scutellerinae): Chrysocoris stolli is a polyphagous phytosuccivorous bug found infesting many foods plants as mentioned in introduction chapter. To know the food preference experiments were conducted in laboratory. For this purpose, adults as well as nymphs were exposed to different parts of each host plants kept in wooden wire gauge cage. This experiment is showed that adults and nymphs fed only on the leaves, seed and inflorescence of food plants. Among a large number of food plants, ten plants were selected to know the preferential feeding of the bug population. The selected plants were Litchi chinensis, Croton bonplandianus, Adhotoda vessica, Croton sparisiflorum, Pannisetium typhoides (Bajra), Brassica compestries, Mangifera indica, Parthenium, Zizyphus mauritiana (Indian jujube), Cassia occidentalies. Then 25 adults and 25 nymphs of C.stolli were released in the cage having food plant parts after two, four and six hours. Then, the number of bugs was counted on each host plant part and noted.