3. Black headed caterpillar: Opisina arenosella (Cryptophasidae: Lepidoptera)

Distribution and status: All over Peninsular India (East and West Coasts)   Damage symptoms: Dried up patches on leaflets of the lower leaves. Galleries of silk and frass on underside of leaflets. Click for More Symptoms

Bionomics
         Greyish white small moth lays about 180 eggs in groups on leaves. Egg period is 5 days. Greenish brown larva with dark brown head and prothorax, and a reddish mesothorax.Larval period 40 days, pupal period 12 days. It pupates inside the web in a thin silken cocoon.

Management

• Cutting and burning all the infested leaves and fronds. Click to View Video
• In small plantations, carbaryl 50 WP 2 g/L may be sprayed.
• In summer, release bethylids, braconid and eulophid parasitoids from January at 1:1:10 per tree.
• Root feeding with monocrotophos @ 10 ml + 10 ml water with a waiting period of 45 days after root feeding.