Impact of intercrop on incidence of ber fruit fly, Carpomyia vesuviana Costa (Diptera: Tephritidae) under hot arid eco-system

Abstract

Ber (Ziziphus mauritiana Lamk.) is an important fruit tree grown under the arid and semi-arid  region of India. Among the various insect pests  infesting ber, fruit fly (Carpomyia vesuviana Costa) is  most destructive and it destroys on an average of 24  persent of fruits (Lakra and Singh, 1984). The existing  management strategies are solely relies upon the  chemical pesticides and usage of bio-pesticides is also  very limited. Use of synthetic chemicals is not  economical and less attractive, while considering  associated health hazards and environment. Summer  ploughing, is an ecologically sound alternative to  chemical control, which destroy the residual pupa and it  is a recommended cultural practice against tephritid  flies. However, often it fails to avoid the migrating  population due to lack in synchronized soil cultivation  among the growers. In this context, the intercropping of  non host or pest repelling plants may be promising  cultural method to check the pest intensity, for  achieving more monetary return from a unit area per  time. Growing annual crops like cluster bean and green  gram between the ber rows as intercrops is a common  and suggested practice under arid ecosystem as it  increased on an average of 10 persent higher monetary  returns over sole ber crop system (Patel et al. 2003).