Influence of weather on the parasitoid catches in three rice growing agroclimatic zones of Tamil Nadu Daniel J. Alfred1,*, Ramaraju K.2, Kumar S. Mohan3, Jeyaprakash P.4, Chitra N.1 1Department of Agricultural Entomology Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Coimbatore, 641003 2Directorate of Research, Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Coimbatore, 641003 3Department of Plant Biotechnology, Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Coimbatore, 641003 4Department of Rice, Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Coimbatore, 641003 *Corresponding author Email: danieljalfred@gmail.com
Online published on 30 April, 2019. Abstract Parasitic hymenopterans play a vital role against many pests of rice regulating them naturally. The present study evaluated the influence of weather factors on such parasitic hymenopterans in rice under three agroclimatic rice zones of Tamil Nadu viz., western, Cauvery delta and high rainfall zones during 2015–16. Collections were made for 20 consecutive days in each zone. The weather data viz., maximum temperature, minimum temperature, relative humidity and rainfall were used correlated with the parasitoid population. These revealed significantly negative correlation with maximum temperature and a positive one with minimum temperature, relative humidity and rainfall in the Cauvery delta zone. In the high rainfall zone, the parasitoid population exhibited positive and significant correlation with rainfall and positive but non-significant correlation with maximum temperature and relative humidity, and negative non-significant correlation with that of minimum temperature. The parasitoid population showed non-significant negative correlation with temperature (maximum and minimum), relative humidity and rainfall in the western zone. Top Keywords Rice ecosystem, agroclimatic zones, Tamil Nadu, parasitoids, rainfall, temperature, Tamil Nadu, correlation, population dynamics. Top |