Paddy Pests
Mealy Bug
Symptoms
- Large number of insects remains in leaf sheath and suck the sap.
- Plants become week, yellowish and very much stunted in circular patches.
- Presence of white waxy fluff in leaf sheaths. The infestation is referred to as ‘Soorai’ disease.
Identification
- Egg: The female lays numerous yellowish white eggs/ simply deposits nymphs in outer leaf sheaths.
- Nymph: The newly hatched nymphs remain are crowded within the waxy filaments for 6-10 h before they disperse to various parts of the same plant. The pale yellowish nymph is active and crawls about the plant for a while and settles itself on the stem and turns dark yellow after a day. Body gets covered with waxy material on second day.
- Adult: Nymphs and adults being wingless look alike. Females are reddish, oval, soft-bodied and living in colonies inside the leaf sheath. Males are small, slender, pale-yellow, having single pair of wings and a style like process at the end of the abdomen but lack mouthparts. Males are seldom found in the colonies, so reproduction is mainly through parthenogenesis .
Management
- Remove the grasses and trim the bunds during the main field preparation before transplanting
- Augment bio-control agents like coccinellids, spiders in the rice field.
- Remove and destroy the affected plants
- Spray any following insecticides
|
Insecticides |
Dosage |
|---|---|
|
500 ml/acre |
|
|
250 g/acre |
|
|
500 ml/acre |
