Seasonal Incidence of Tomato Fruit Borer, Helicoverpa armigera (Hubner) and Its Correlation with Abiotic Factors: An Experimental Investigation

A study on seasonal incidence of the tomato fruit borer, Helicoverpa armigera (Hubner) on tomato was conducted under field conditions at Vegetable Research Station, CSAUA&T, Kanpur during Rabi season 2021-2022. The incidence of fruit borer commenced in the 47th standard week (third week of November) with an average population of 0.2 larvae per m row length. The fruit borer population increased and gradually reached its peak level of 7.8 larvae per m row length in the 3rd standard week (January third week), after that, a declining trend was observed. As regards abiotic factors, rainfall (r=0.4727), maximum relative humidity (r=0.3306), minimum relative humidity (r=0.7544) and wind speed (r=0.6039) had a significant positive correlation with the fruit borer population. Maximum temperature (r=-0.7616) and minimum temperature (r=-0.6327) are negatively correlated with the fruit borer population.