Varietal preference and population dynamics of Notacaphylla chinensiae Mohanasundaram and Singh on litchi in West Bengal, India

The litchi white rust mite, Notacaphylla chinensiae Mohanasundaram and Singh, 1988 is a pest of litchi in West Bengal, India. Study on population dynamics, sensitiveness of litchi cultivars towards the mite was conducted between 2009 and 2011. The mite remains active on litchi plants throughout the year in West Bengal, reaching the highest population densities (1300 to 1500 mites/cm2 leaf) in winter (January/ February). Population densities of N. chinensiae was negatively correlated with monthly mean of the maximum temperature (–0.492), minimum temperature (–0.785), rainfall (–0.665) and minimum humidity (–0.829). Among 11 litchi cultivars, the highest mean population throughout the year was recorded on Nafarpal (440–584 mites/cm2 leaf) followed by Elaichi (431–597 mites/cm2 leaf), Bombai (437–600 mites/cm2leaf) and Seedless late (444–594 mites/cm2 leaf), whereas the lowest was assessed on Purbi (146–167 mites/cm2 leaf) followed by Muzaffarpur (148–184 mites/cm2 leaf).