ABSTRACT
Black gram (Vigna mungo L.) is widely cultivated during May to September under the rainfed unbunded uplands of Purulia, West Bengal and the produces are stored by farmers under homestead condition for the purpose of consumption and seed for the next year sowing. Callosobruchus sp.(Coleoptera: Chrysomelidae) is the major stored grain pest of blackgram under homestead condition resulting 15 – 30% grain damage during storage. An attempt was made to identify a practical and low cost solution of such damage with the active participation of village women responsible for the storage. Proven biological, chemical and botanical (vegetable oil) approaches of management were tested against traditional practice and replicated among 10 different household at 10 villages. Results showed that grain dressing with both neem and mustard oil under botanical approaches performed significantly superior over other approaches and traditional practice in terms reduction in percent infestation (92%), increase in germination percentage (36.04%), 88% increase in the quantity of viable seed after storage and benefit-cost ratio. Therefore, seed dressing with neem or mustard oil at 2ml/kg seed can be finally recommended from the present findings for safe storage of black gram for the purpose of food and seed under homestead conditions of Purulia district of West Bengal.
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