VALUATION OF CASTOR VARIETIES BASED ON THE PERFORMANCE OF ERI SILKWORM SAMIA CYNTHIA RICINI
Eri culture has been proven beneficial and gainful employment to the castor farmers, as 30% of defoliation will not affect the seed yield. Seeds of high oil yielding castor hybrids / varieties viz. DCS-9, 48-1, DCH-519, DCH-177 along with local variety are collected from Directorate of Oil Seeds Research, Hyderabad. The performance of eri silkworm viz. larval traits, cocoon traits and grainage traits were studied by feeding them with the leaves of five castor genotypes separately in tray rearing method for three seasons for two consecutive years. The rearing performance and economic cocoon parameters were very much influenced by temperature and humidity. Season specificity was noticed in rearing performance of eri silkworm, and observed maximum yield during winter and rainy season than in summer. Local and DCH-519 castor genotypes are found to be superior in terms of shell ratio during three seasons. This study reveals that castor farmer can switch to DCH- 519 hybrid castor cultivation for eri culture as it yields more after local castor variety would be double beneficial to the farmer in terms of castor oil and silk yield.