Department of Entomology, G.B. Pant University of Agriculture & Technology, Pantnagar-263 145 (U.P.)
Susceptibility of 12 chickpea cultivars against Heliothis armigera (Hubner) was investigated under field conditions during rabi 1983–84 and 1984–85. Develop-ment of H. armigera was also studied under laboratory conditions. Data on egg counts showed variation from 4.2 (ICC 10619) to 7.2 (ICCC 14) per plant in 1984 and 8.5 (Pant G 114) to 14.1 (ICCC 14) per plant in 1985. The number of larvae per plant varied from 11.9 on ICCL 79067 to 17.2 on ICC 1403 and 7 on ICCL 79067 to 14 on ICC 10619 in 1984 and 1985 respectively.
Per cent pod damage ranged from 46% in ICC 10613 to 68% in ICCL 79067 with significant differences in 1984. In 1985, pod damage varied from 26 per cent (ICC 19619) to 39 per cent (K 850) and ICC 1403, ICC 10613 and ICC 10619 showed significantly reduced pod damage than local cv. Pant G 114. The expression of genetic differences for pest susceptibility was, thus, confounded with the conditions of test environment.
The life cycle of H. armigera, under laboratory conditions, varied from 22 to 30 days on different cultivars. The cultivar ICC 10619 prolonged the life of insect cycle upto 30 days.
The ICC 10613, ICC 10619 and ICCL 79048 can be advocated as donor pare-nts for breeding programmes.
