PCPMS

Alternate Host: Palmyra, date palm, wild date, areca, sago palm, pandanus, pineapple, colocasia, banana, oil palm and sugar cane

Occurrence: round the year with a spike during June to Sept during which the adults visit the crowns. Population level is higher in younger plantations having decaying organic matter lying around.

Life Cycle:

The eggs are white or whitish brown with a size ranging from 3-4 mm long and 2 3 mm wide. They are laid in the decaying organic matter, cattle dung, compost and decaying logs etc. On hatching, the yellowish white grub with brown head and grayish blue abdomen remain and feed on decaying organic matter for about six months and pupate there itself. The pupa lies in cocoon or cell composed of soil and agglomerated debris. The pupal stage lasts for 14 29 days.

The peak adult emergence is from June to September. The adult is stout black with cephalic horn (Prominent in case of males). The adult beetle after emerging from the breeding ground rests for 5 25 days and then flies to the crown top for feeding. The fecundity of the female is 108 eggs with a longevity for 142 days. Males live for about 120 days. The peak oviposition periods occur in February April and September to October.

The black colored beetle bores holes and feeds on the unopened fronds and spathe. On opening, the damaged leaves show geometric cuts (V shaped) on leaf lets. If the damage is severe, several cuts can be seen one above the other. The beetles cause damage to seedling, young and adult palms. Damage when done to the leaves, reduces the photosynthetic area and renders them unsuitable for thatching purpose, but when damage is done to spathe it causes direct crop loss. The beetles also cause death of the seedling / young palms by destroying the growing points. Apart from feeding damage they serve as predisposers for red weevil attack, bud rot and leaf rot infestation. Repeated damage done to the meristem may be lethal

Management

Remove the dead and decaying organic debris from coconut plantations as they serve as breeding ground for beetles. Dead planting material that is rotting or that which will rot if accumulated must be burnt. The fallen trunks must be spilt and burnt.

During peak period of population buildup, the adult beetle may be extracted from the palm crown using GI hooks. The holes thus made should be filled with mixture of 3 g Mancozeb + 1 kg fine sand.

Prophylactic leaf axil filling with 10.5 g (Approx. 4 Nos.) of naphthalene balls + sand is to be done at 45 days interval.

The breeding site of the beetles viz ., cattle dung, compost and other decaying organic debris is to be treated with carbaryl 50 % WP at 0.01 % on W/W basis.

Release baculovirus inoculated beetles @ 10 15 beetles / ha. Inoculation of beetles with Oryctes virus can be done directly feeding them with viral suspension or allowing them to crawl over the suspension.

The breeding sites may be treated with green muscardine fungus, Metarhizium anisopliae . This fungus can be mass multiplied on local materials such as coconut water and cassava chips. Application of these fungus @ 5 x 10 11 spores / m³ of breeding site during monsoon season yields desirable results.

Insect predators are frequently observed in the breeding sites. Santalus parallelus , Pheropsophus occipitalis , Harpalus sp., Scarites sp.,and Agrypnus sp., are some of the promising predators. The immature and adult stages of the predator's consume the various bio stages of rhinoceros beetle. The exotic reduviid predator Platymeris laevicollis is mass multiplied on ground roaches and released on the palm crowns @ 6 bugs / palm. Though they caused a significant reduction in beetle population they failed to establish under field condition.

The nematode cum bacterium culture (DD136) caused 60 100 % mortality of the grubs.