Diet impacts on the biological aspects of pink bollworm, Pectinophora gossypiella (Lepidoptera: Gelechiidae) under controlled laboratory conditions

Abstract

Background Pink bollworm, Pectinophora gossypiella (Lepidoptera: Gelechiidae) is a native pest of Asia and preferably invasion on cotton (Gossypium hirsutum L.) crop as a commendatory host plant. Commercially, G. hirsutum is known as white gold and is an important cash crop all over the globe. Limited studies were published to focus on certain dietary compositions against different cotton pests. Therefore, the present study was undertaken in the laboratory under controlled conditions (temperature: 27 ± 2°C and relative humidity: 60 ± 10%) to determine the impact of three different treatment diets (wheat germ meal, okra, and chickpea) on the biological aspects (lifetime, developmental period) of P. gossypiella. Results Results revealed that the shortest larval time of P. gossypiella was observed on the okra feed diet while the longest period was recorded on the wheat germ diet. Meanwhile, the pupation delay was noted on the wheat germ diet. The dietary influence was also observed on adult stages of female and male P. gossypiella (43.00 and 37.50 days respectively) and compared with a standard diet (56.50 and 52.50 days respectively). Furthermore, larval weighed more on the okra and chickpea diet followed by the wheat germ diet, whereas highest pupal weight was observed on the standard diet followed by the chickpea diet and okra diet. Conclusion Developmental parameters were significantly variant across all treatment diets, whereas the higher significant difference was reported on the okra diet. Therefore, the existing data of this study offers fruitful interventions for the future as a modified diet for large-scale and rapid mass production of P. gossypiella larvae.

Influence of natural and non-natural diets on the fitness and rearing of Pectinophora gossypiella Saunders

“…The biology/fitness of P. gossypiella has been covered on various natural host plants and cotton, corn and wheat based artificial diets using old/simple table analysis in a number of studies 28 , 33 – 35 . When study the biology of an insect on artificial diet as compared to growing on natural food, feeding promote fitness reduces the amount of work, time, space, and money needed to cultivate the host plants.…”

“…The larval duration of P. gossypiella was in the range of 18–21 days on a chickpea flour- and wheat-gram-based diet 28 . However, in another study it was reported that the average larval duration of P. gossypiella was 25 days on an artificial diet 43 .…”

“…The study of basic information of insect pests is necessary for their integrated pest management (IPM) 22 , 23 . However, the biology and rearing of P. gossypiella have been reported on cotton bolls 24 , okra 25 , artificial diets including cotton seed, chickpea flours 25 , 26 , Bt and non-Bt cotton bolls 27 , and wheat germ 28 via traditional life table tools. To study the basic information on artificial diet is more convenient.…”

Fatty acids for insect species remain constant: A case study of pink bollworm, Pectinophora gossypiella (Saunders)

“…The pest has a restricted host range with cotton (Gossypium spp.) as the most preferred host, followed by okra (Hibiscus esculentus L.); alternatively the pest also thrives on almost 70 species distributed across seven families in 24 plant genera (Ihsan et al, 2021). The adult female moth preferably lays her eggs on tender leaves, squares and flower buds, singly or in small groups.…”

Retraction: Diet impacts on the biological aspects of pink bollworm, Pectinophora gossypiella (Lepidoptera: Gelechiidae) under controlled laboratory conditions

“…The PLOS ONE Editors retract this article [ 1 ] because it was identified as one of a series of submissions for which we have concerns about authorship, competing interests, and peer review. We regret that the issues were not addressed prior to the article’s publication.…”