Review on Beetles (Coleopteran): An Agricultural Major Crop Pests of the World

The present review deals on major Coleopteran beetles of agricultural crop pests include 45 genera and 55 species from 15 families. Most of beetles are pest of cereals and millets (3), oil seed crops (2), fibre crops (4), vegetables (11), temperate fruits (7), sub-tropical and tropical fruits (9), ornamental plants (2), plantation crop (8), spices (4) and stored grains (5). Among families; Curculionidae was dominated by 12 (21.8 %) species followed by Chrysomelidae 10(18.18 %), Cerambycidae 9(16.3 %), Scarabaeridae 6(10.9 %), Coccinellidae 3(5.4 %), Apionidae, Bostrychidae, Brachidae, Buprestidae and Scolytidae each with two species (3.6 %). Whereas families like Dermestidae, Lamiidae, Meloidae, Melonithidae and Tenebrionidae contribute each with single species (1.8 %). Key-wordsColeopteran beetle, Cereals, Spices, Stored grains, temperate fruits. INTRODUCTION The coleopterans include more species than any other order, constituting almost 25 % of all known types of animal life forms [1] . About 4, 50,000 species of beetles occurs representing about 40 % of all known insects [2] . Such a large number of species poses special problems for classification. Among them, about 75 % of beetle species are polyphagous in both larval and adult stages, and live in or on plants, wood as well as a variety of stored products [3-4]. Because many of these plants are important for agriculture, forestry and the household, beetles can be considered pest and some of them cause significant damage, particularly direct and indirect losses [5] . There are several studies on different families of coleopteran by different research workers [6-7] . The pest problems originated with the origin of agriculture. As soon as the land was cleared of natural vegetation and replaced by a single species of food plant, human came into conflict with phytophagous insect [8-9] . It was reported that the insect pest problems in agriculture are probably as old as agriculture itself [10] . However, rapidly increasing population during the last century has necessitated intensification of agriculture through expansion of irrigation facilities, introduction of high yielding varieties (HYVs) and application of increased amount of agrochemicals increased the production of land with a concomitant increase in the production lost to insect pest [11-12] . Access this article online Quick Response Code Website: