Some Natural and Chemical Compounds Directly Affect Pests of Mulberry Trees and Their Side Effects on Silkworm Larvae

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

Plant Protection Department, Faculty of Agriculture, Ain Shams University, P.O. Box 68, Hadayek Shoubra 11241, Cairo, Egypt

Abstract

Mulberry trees suffer from many pest infestations. To control these pests, some natural compounds such as Techno Oil and Top 9 and some other chemicals such as Mospilan® and Chinook® were used. Mulberry trees, Morus nigra were treated with three different concentrations of each of Chinook, Techno Oil® and Top 9® to reduce infestation with Icerya sp. and Ferrisia virgate. A high reduction rate of more than 90% occurred when using these pesticides. On the other hand, the corrected mortality of mulberry silkworm larvae was 93.3%, 0.0% and 6.7% respectively after 8 days of treatment. When treating mulberry trees Morus alba with two different concentrations of each of pesticides; Mospilan and Techno Oil against whitefly, the average rate of infestation reduction was 100% and 94.94%, respectively. The corrected mortality of mulberry silkworms' larvae was 100% and 0.0% after 8 days of treatment respectively. This study proved that natural compounds could be used safely instead of chemical pesticides to reduce the pest population without affecting the life of silkworm larvae or cocoon properties.

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