Effect of Weevil Infestation on Maize Seed and Feed Quality at Different Storage Periods

Abstract

In the seed /grain samples collected from six months old stock, the highest mean number (32.33) of rice weevils were recorded in Venkatesh Poultry Feed, Karimnagar and Sanjeev Reddy poultry feed, Nizamabad with per cent damage 14.50 and 13.63 per cent respectively. The significantly highest population of rice weevils were recorded in the one year old samples collected from Sharanya Poultry Feed, Karimnagar (36.00) with per cent damage 13.07 %. Similarly the highest mean population of rice weevils were recorded in MARKFED, Ranga reddy (187.67) with per cent damage 53.33 in samples collected from two years old seed stocks. The data indicate population buildup from six months to one year was not significant but population increased by five to six folds from six months to two years storage duration. Germination percentage of the maize samples collected from different locations from six months, one year and two years old stocks showed negative and highly significant relationship with population of Sitophilus oryzae (L.) (-0.86, 0.92 and 0.99, respectively) and similar trend was observed with its infestation (-0.87, -0.96 and -0.99, respectively). While, moisture content (per cent) of the maize samples of six months, one year and two years old stocks collected from different location showed positive and non significant relationship with population of Sitophilus oryzae (l.) (0.49, 0.51 and 0.78) and with its infestation similar trend was noticed (0.39, 0.46 and 0.80), respectively. The population size of weevils and the storage period are the factors that have the highest influence on seed germination.