ADILABAD: The failure of the pheromone pest traps is a suspected to be a major reason for spread of pink bollworm (Pectinophora gossypiella) in cotton crop at Jamidi village in Tamsi mandal of Adilabad district. Farmers say that they failed to gauge the intensity of pest attack due to the dysfunctional ‘lures’ in the pheromone traps supplied by Pest Control India Pvt. Ltd. (PCI).
Cotton crop not only at Jamidi but Dhanora in the same mandal and many villages in Neredigonda, Bazarhatnoor and Talamadugu mandals came under pink bollworm attack, unusually in August itself.
The farmers of Jamidi however, were quick to react to the situation and bought 3,000 pheromone traps from the Bengaluru-based company to control bring the pest attack under check.
Effective solution
“PCI representatives told us that five traps per acre of crop would help in monitoring the incidence of the pest and 10 traps would be effective to control the pest,” farmer Sarsan Bhooma Reddy said. “These traps were ineffective as the lures did not attract the male insects,” he added.
“If the five ‘monitor’ traps in an acre of cotton attract eight or more insects each for three consecutive days, it shows that the pest attack has crossed the economic threshold level or acceptable level and 10 would trap a higher number of insects,” concurred Coordinator Adilabad District Agriculture Advisory and Transfer of Technology Centre Sudhanshu Kasbe.
“However, it cannot be said that the pheromone traps alone would completely control pink bollworm attack,” he added.
Complacency
The farmers had become complacent when they saw no insects being trapped by the lure and thought that there was no pest attack. “It was only when the damage was done that we realised that the traps were useless and purchased a different set,” chairman of the local Primary Agriculture Cooperative Society, which bought the traps, Baddam Vinod Reddy said.
“After realising that the traps were a waste, we informed the PCI at Bengaluru who sent two of their representatives to the visited the field to assess the situation. The visiting representatives found that the traps had failed,” Vinod Reddy claimed.