Roy N

M. U. C. Women’s College, Department of Zoology, Ecology Research Unit, Burdwan-713104, West Bengal, India
Author    Correspondence author
International Journal of Horticulture, 2015, Vol. 5, No. 4   doi: 10.5376/ijh.2015.05.0004
Received: 18 Feb., 2015    Accepted: 13 Mar., 2015    Published: 16 Apr., 2015

This is an open access article published under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Roy, 2015, Host phytochemicals in regulation of nutritional ecology and population dynamics of Podontia quatuordecimpunctata L. (Coleoptera :Chrysomelidae), International Journal of Horticulture, 2015, Vol.5, No.4 1-11 (doi: 10.5376/ijh.2015.05.0004)

Determination ofhost preference depends on chemical cues including nutritional requirements is a cornerstone in insect pest ecology and their control. Their nutritional ecology and demographic parameters are co-related with the variation of host phytochemical regime. Here, the host preference in relation to feeding dynamics and life table parameters of Podontia quatuordecimpunctata L. were studied under laboratory conditions. The feeding indices and population parameters of P. quatuordecimpunctata were significantly higher (P < 0.05) on Spondias pinnata relative to S. dulcis (Anacardiaceae) due to the variation in their phytochemical regime of the respective host plants. The pest on S. pinnata has shorter mean generation time (T_c) of 143.333±0.265 days with higher net reproductive rate (R₀) of 31.160±2.553. Their generation survival (GS) on S. pinnata (0.663) is significantly higher than S. dulcis (0.513) with reverse of total generation mortality (K). Thus, the pestshowed more feeding preference and higher reproductive growth to its host plant, S. pinnata than S. dulcis. This research supports the previous studies on insect nutrition in relation to their host phytochemicals and support to find the most vulnerable stage of this pest for appropriate control measures. It also provides the importance of S. pinnata as a trapping plant to avoid or minimum invasion of this pest towards S. dulcis for their better yields.

Host preference; Nutritional ecology; Demographic parameters; Feeding dynamics; Phytochemical regime; Ttrapping plant