Evaluation of acaricidal efficacy of some botanicals and conventional acaricides for management of yellow mite (Polyphagotarsonemus latus Banks) of chilli

Chilli (Capsicum annum Linn.) is one of the important vegetables and spice crops in India. Yellow mite (Polyphagotarsonemus latus Banks) is an important pest, which is responsible for causing loss in yield from 15 to 28 per cent. Based on the mean results of field experiment conducted in the two consecutive years, it was found that need based foliar spray with neem oil proved to be the most effective in management of mite (P. latus) causing upto 71.50 per cent mortality of the pest, which in turn result the highest yield of green chilli (96.80 q ha⁻¹). However, all the neem based pesticides viz. Multineem, Neembecidine, Neemazal and Neemguard were found significantly effective against the pest causing 67.90 to 69.80 per cent mortality of the pest resulting in appreciably higher yield of green fruits of chilli ranging from 90.60 to 93.60 q ha⁻¹. Moreover, the chemical acaricide, propargite 57EC @ 2.50 ml l⁻¹ of water caused the overall maximum mortality of the mite (87.00%) and dicofol 18.50 EC @ 2.5 ml l⁻¹ of water remained at par resulting in the overall highest yield of green fruits of chilli viz. 105.60 and 102.70 q ha⁻¹. The pongamia oil (5 ml l⁻¹ of water) also gave rise to the appreciable pest killing (68.50%) with higher yields of fruits (92.40 q ha⁻¹).