Diversity of mite fauna and population dynamics of red spider mite, Tetranychus urticae (Koch.) associated with rose in West Bengal, India

The present studies were undertaken to explore the mite fauna associated with rose ecosystem and also to study the population fluctuation of red spider mite (Tetranychus urticae Koch) on rose in West Bengal. A total eight species of predatory mites belonging to the family Phytoseiidae viz., Amblyseius largoensis (Muma, 1955), Amblyseius herbicolus (Muma), Typhlodromips syzygii (Gupta, 1975), Euseius ovalis (Evans, 1953), Euseius alstoniae (Gupta, 1975), Euseius finlandicus, Scapulaseius asiaticus (Evans, 1953) and Phytoseius roseus (Gupta, 1969) were recorded on rose plant. Among them, Amblyseius largoensis was found as the predominant species occupied 21.21% of total population followed by Typhlodromips syzygii (12.92%) in rose ecosystem. The other important predatory mites belong to the families Tydeidae, Bdellidae and Cunaxidae under the order Prostigmata was observed during the period of investigation. The phytophagous mites belong to the families Tetranychidae, Tetranychus urticae (Koch), Eutetranychus orientalis, (Klein.) Schizotetranychus andropogoni (Hirst.) and Oligonychus coffeae and Panonychus sp. and Tenuipalpidae Brevipalpus phoenicis, (Geisk) were identified and found as a key mite pest of rose. So far as phytophagous mite, Tranychus urticae was found dominant species occupied 22.72% of total population. Red spider mite, Tetranychus urticae population was appeared on rose plant during January - February and remained very low population due to cold winter then the population gradually increased with the rising of temperature and reached its peak population during the month of May and after that the population gradually dwindled on account of rainfall and in subsequent time prevailed of cold winter. Regarding the correlation studies, it was revealed that maximum temperature (r = 0.76) and maximum relative humidity (%) (r = 0.51) was exhibited significant positive correlation whereas, minimum temperature (r = -0.75) and total rainfall (r = -0.72) was established significantly negative correlation with mite population.