Lesser grain borer, Rhyzopertha dominica infests speciality food crop makhana, Euryale ferox in India

Abstract

Makhana is a popular popped snack in south-east Asia due to its high nutritional value. During storage of roasted makhana seeds, Rhyzopertha dominica found feeding which later found affecting significantly the popping quality. Detailed study elucidated that adults preferred 11 mm size seeds, average 2 grubs and 1 adult per seed was found feeding inside, wherein they bored ∼2 holes, apart from natural hole and caused 49.3% damage in 75 days storage. With an artificial infestation of 150 adults per kg of seed, recorded maximum damage (46.80%) with 4.77 mg of seed dust produced. Insect successfully completed its life cycle on roasted makhana seeds in 100-125 days. Female laid 242 ± 7 eggs at 28 °C, and 210 ± 11 eggs at 32 °C. The infestation led to significant change in seed quality like popping, moisture, ash and crude fibre. The commonly available management strategy like UV light trapping was done, and peak attraction was reported at 8 pm (27%). Study showed feed preference, biology and management option, which can be useful for devising the insect management in makhana storage.

Highlights

1. Study related to the speciality crop foxnut, commonly called makhana, Euryale ferox, which is having higher commercial importance

2. Rhyzopertha dominica, a polyphagous insect successfully expanded its hosts, and completed its life cycle in 100-125 days on roasted Makhana seeds

3. Insect preferred 11 mm size roasted seeds (49.3 ± 0.50% seeds damaged in 75 days) than those of 7 and 9 mm roasted seeds. Unlike other hosts, showed internal feeding behaviour, affected the quality and popping in a significant way

4. Rhyzopertha dominica can be efficiently trapped using UV light traps (370 ± 10 nm wavelength) in roasted makhana seed storage, which is an effective and non-chemical management option

Keywords:

• Rhyzopertha dominica
• makhana
• life cycle
• Euryale ferox
• light trap

Acknowledgments

The authors are thankful to Central Institute of Post-Harvest Engineering and Technology (CIPHET) of Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR), Government of India, for providing facilities for conducting the experimentation.

Ethics approval and consent to participate

The research paper is written based on the novel work done under laboratory conditions. The authors have understood and formulated the paper in response to research ethics.

Consent for publication

The authors hereby give their consent for publication.

Authors’ contributions

Guru P N: Conceptualisation, Experimentation, recording observations and analysis of the data, writing of paper. Vishwakarma RK: Reviewing of the paper draft, facilities, and raw materials. Mridula D.: Technical guidance, reviewing of the manuscript. Muskaan Gupta: Data analysis, makhana quality analysis, reviewing of the manuscript.

Disclosure statement

The authors can confirm there are no potential conflicts of interest associated with this work.