A NEW STEM BORER INFESTING TASAR SILKWORM FOOD PLANTS

Abstract

The tropical tasar silk is produced by the tasar silkworm, Antherea mylitta Drury. Since therearing is conducted on the trees of Arjun, Termilalia arjuna, Asan, T.tomentosa, Sal, Shorea robustaetc. the qualitative or quantitative production of the silk or seed directly dependent upon the qualityor amount of foliage available and utilized for tasar silkworm rearing. With the infestation of the foodplant by any pests, the production of foliage and thereby, production of tasar silk and quality seedare liable to be affected.The round headed stem borers and the flat headed stem borer are most common. Theseborers affect Arjun (T. arjuna), Asan (T. tomentosa) and Sal (Shorea robusta). Most of the borersattacking tasar food plants belonging to family Cerambycidae and Buprestidae of order Coleoptera.The stem borer infesting T. arjuna reported now is belonging to a new species Sphenopteraaerosa. The new species belongs to the family Buprestidae and the order Coleoptera.Various parameters were studied like symptoms of infestation, survival of plants and damagetype. The infestation of this new species ranged from 19 to 31 % in different blocks of plantation.