Indian Journal of Ecology

Food baits are one of the strategies for monitoring and mass trapping of the stored product insects. Based on this principle, a study was conducted at central farm storage godown, Agricultural College and Research Institute, Madurai during March-April, 2021 by placing wheat flour, sorghum flour, pearl millet flour, rice flour, cracked corn, crushed groundnut, rice bran + rice flour as luring materials. Observations on trapped adult insects were taken on 25 days after placement of bait traps. Amongst the baits tested, wheat flour, cracked sorghum, pearl millet flour were the most attractive for stored grain pests of paddy. Wheat flour attracted 21.01% of Angoumois grain moth, Sitotroga cerealella and 13.38% of rice weevil, Sitophilus oryzae. Cracked sorghum registered attraction of 10.93% lesser grain borer, Rhyzopertha dominica and 13.10% of red flour beetle, Tribolium spp. Pearl millet flour attracted 11.65% of saw-toothed grain beetle, Oryzaephilus surinamensis. These effective baits were also test verified through four-arm olfactometer and found the highest orientation in the arm containing wheat flour by attracting S. oryzae, Tribolium spp. and R. dominica of 43.19, 39.61 and 37.41% respectively which possessed nonane, undecane, 3-octen-1-ol, butanal and pentanal volatile compounds. Therefore, the wheat flour may be exploited as an effective bait material for monitoring and mass trapping of S. cerealella, R. dominica, Tribolium spp. and O. surinamensis in storage godowns of paddy.