SURVEY OF RODENT DAMAGE IN SUGARCANE FIELDS OF PUNJAB AND ITS CONTROL BY RODENTICIDAL BAITING

摘要

A survey carried out from ten villages of districts Jalandhar and Kapurthala of Punjab, revealed an average of 1.53 to 33.11% rodent damage in Sugarcane fields. Out of these surveyed locations 0-15% rodent damage was observed at 80% of the randomly selected fields, while damage above 15% and up to 60% was found only in 20% fields, especially where there was lodging of the canes. For evaluating the amount of rodenticide bait to be placed in the sugarcane fields, four trials (each with 3 acres of area)along with the control trials were conducted by placing poison bait @ 400,800,1600 and 3200 g/acre at villages Powari and Karyana of district Jalandhar. First poison baiting with 2% zinc phosphide in the end of November followed by 0.005% bromadiolone baiting after 15 days, resulted in significant reduction of rodent damage in the treated fields of all the trials as compared to that of control fields. Double poison baiting with 1600 g of poison bait/acre was successful in achieving 70.92% rodent control success.