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Dr. Rajendra Prasad Central Agricultural University, Pusa

In the imperial Gazetteer of India 1878, Pusa was recorded as a government estate of about 1350 acres in Darbhanba. It was acquired by East India Company for running a stud farm to supply better breed of horses mainly for the army. Frequent incidence of glanders disease (swelling of glands), mostly affecting the valuable imported bloodstock made the civil veterinary department to shift the entire stock out of Pusa. A British tobacco concern Beg Sutherland & co. got the estate on lease but it also left in 1897 abandoning the government estate of Pusa. Lord Mayo, The Viceroy and Governor General, had been repeatedly trying to get through his proposal for setting up a directorate general of Agriculture that would take care of the soil and its productivity, formulate newer techniques of cultivation, improve the quality of seeds and livestock and also arrange for imparting agricultural education. The government of India had invited a British expert. Dr. J. A. Voelcker who had submitted as report on the development of Indian agriculture. As a follow-up action, three experts in different fields were appointed for the first time during 1885 to 1895 namely, agricultural chemist (Dr. J. W. Leafer), cryptogamic botanist (Dr. R. A. Butler) and entomologist (Dr. H. Maxwell Lefroy) with headquarters at Dehradun (U.P.) in the forest Research Institute complex. Surprisingly, until now Pusa, which was destined to become the centre of agricultural revolution in the country, was lying as before an abandoned government estate. In 1898. Lord Curzon took over as the viceroy. A widely traveled person and an administrator, he salvaged out the earlier proposal and got London’s approval for the appointment of the inspector General of Agriculture to which the first incumbent Mr. J. Mollison (Dy. Director of Agriculture, Bombay) joined in 1901 with headquarters at Nagpur The then government of Bengal had mooted in 1902 a proposal to the centre for setting up a model cattle farm for improving the dilapidated condition of the livestock at Pusa estate where plenty of land, water and feed would be available, and with Mr. Mollison’s support this was accepted in principle. Around Pusa, there were many British planters and also an indigo research centre Dalsing Sarai (near Pusa). Mr. Mollison’s visits to this mini British kingdom and his strong recommendations. In favour of Pusa as the most ideal place for the Bengal government project obviously caught the attention for the viceroy.

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Subject: Entomology × Author: Choudhury, Srishti × End date: 2022 × Start date: 2020 × Type: Thesis ×
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    ThesisItemOpen Access
    Seasonal incidence of major insect pests, diversity of their natural enemies and persistence of imidacloprid in boro rice
    (DRPCAU, PUSA, 2022) Choudhury, Srishti; Ahmad, Md. Abbas
    Out of the several pests observed in the boro rice ecosystem at Pusa, the yellow stem borer, leaf folder, whorl maggot and gundhi bug were observed to cause maximum damage to the crop. The maximum incidence of dead heart and white ears was seen during the 14th standard week of April and 20th standard week of May respectively. Dead heart incidence had a significant negative correlation with rainfall, whereas white ear head incidence was seen to have a significant positive correlation with rainfall, minimum temperature and relative humidity. The leaf folder incidence peaked during the 17th standard week of April with 62.93 per cent incidence and represented a positive and significant relation with respect to rainfall and bright sunshine hours. In case of whorl maggot, maximum incidence of 3.43% was recorded during the 16th standard week of April and there was a negative but significant relationship with minimum temperature as well as relative humidity in the evening. Gundhi bug incidence reached its peak point (4.05%) at the 21st standard week of May and showed a significant positive correlation with minimum temperature. The sweep net and handpicking methods used to capture natural enemies revealed that lady bird beetles, mirid bugs, dragonfly, damselfly, spiders and rove beetles were the dominant ones during Rabi 2021-22 in the boro rice production ii system. Among them, lady bird beetles had the highest relative abundance (30.07%), followed by spiders (16.70%), rove beetles (14.59%), damselfly (14.05%), dragonfly (13.64%) and mirid bugs (10.93%). The number of lady bird beetles, dragonfly and damselfly were observed to be the maximum during the months of March to April whereas spiders, mirid bugs and rove beetles reached maximum numbers during May. Representative samples of water after the first application, field soil and paddy leaves after the second application whereas that of straw, grain and husk at the harvesting period were collected and analyzed using modified QuEChERS technique. In water, at 0 day (2hrs after application) after the first application, the mean initial residue was 0.03 mg/kg at double dose (90 g a.i/ha) whereas at 45 g a.i./ha and 60 g a.i/ha, the residues were below the LOQ (0.01 mg/kg) and 1 day after applying the insecticide, the insecticide was undetectable in case of all the treatments. In soil samples, maximum residues were found at 0 day (2hrs after second application) for all the doses. The residues dissipated below the LOQ (0.05 mg/kg) after 15 days of the second application in case of the recommended dose. On the other hand, for 1.5 times the recommended dose and double dose, the amount of residues reached below the LOQ (0.05 mg/kg) after 30 days. In case of paddy leaves, the maximum level of residue was found after 3 days of the second application. After fifteen days of second application, residues in leaves were found to move below the LOQ (0.05 mg/kg) for 45 g a.i/ha as well as 60 g a.i/ha. However, at the double dose (90 g a.i/ha) the residues were found to be undetectable (<0.05 mg/kg) after 30 days of second application. Residue level was found to be below the limit of quantification (0.05mg/kg) in the harvest samples of grains, straw and husk. Hence, imidacloprid 0.3G wasn‟t found to cause issues of residual toxicity in the paddy production ecosystem.