Diversity and Abundance of Edible Orthopterans Insects and their Future Prospects for Food Security of the People in Baksa District, Assam, India

Abstract

Assam in North East India is very rich in diversity of edible insects. Most of the insects are eaten by tribal people as nutritious and tasty food. Orthopteran species such as grasshoppers (Acrididae and Tettigoniidae) and crickets (Mole cricket and House cricket) are major insects eaten by tribal people such as Bodo, Rabha, Sarania, Tea Tribes etc. in study area. Most of these species are pests of crops and vegetables which damage the crops and reduce their yield. These species are eaten as food by ethnic people of the study area and they have incredible prospects in food security. The diversity of orthopterans was calculated by using “Shannon Wiener Index. Species diversity was determined following Shannon Wiener’s Index (Shannon and Weaver, 1963, Ludwig and Reynolds, 1988). During this study period, a total of 10 species of Orthoptera belonging to 4 families of 10 genera were recorded. Family Acrididae was dominant with (5 species), followed by Tettigoniidae (2 species), Gryllidae (2 species) and then followed by Gryllotalpidae (1 species). Agricultural Field habitat such as Paddy fields and Open field habitat such as grassland areas contribute to richness in diversity of Orthopteran species. Shannon-Weiner diversity index (H’) was applied to find out whether any significant difference existed in the insect diversity between different habitats. Simpson’s diversity index was used to measure the diversity which allows the number of species present as well as the relative abundance of each species. The largest number of edible Orthopteran is available during June to September (pre monsoon and monsoon) and then gets gradually reduced from retreating monsoon to winter season.