I am conducting pot trials with Soybean. After 10 - 12 days the cotyledons and first set of unifoliate leaves are eaten by some organism.
For Mouse, I have kept all post in 1/2inch x 1/2 inch iron mesh cage of 5 feet x 10 feet.
For leaf eating green worm, I checked twice thrice for any evidence, but that's not the case.
During previous set (last month) I applied Thymate from all sides but it did not help, similar happened and I had to repeat.
This time suspecting some work eating leaves I also sprayed Chloropyriphos but haven't got any success.
Kindly help. I am attaching photographs
Dear Rohan
You told that mesh size of 0.5 inch X 0.5 inches.To best of my knowledge,it will allow any size of insects to come in and forage on plants. one thing from your pictures is clear that it is an insect which is eating young leaves at succulent stage.Therefore, I recommend that you simply buy one mosquito net of slightly bigger size than your cage and wrap it all around so that nothing can come in or move out.Besides this give one spray of any fume making insecticide so as to quarantine the experimental area and all around the cage place esp where any other vegetation or wild plants or weeds are growing.
Good luck
Dear Sir, thank you for your response.
One minor query- will a mosquito net not block sunlight? As the setup is already in shed net with diffuse light.
Also my assistant told me that during last set-up, in case of few plants which reached maturity, the grains in the pod we're eaten away.. leaving behind only the pod shell.
Could this be a type of chameleon?
No Chameleon activity.There may be very few restriction on light but rest assured your seedling will not get etiolated just due to mosquito net.
It is for sure an insect , smaller enough.so the mosquito net usage within this structure will be definitely give you results.
My guess is that it is a cutworm of some sort: the larval stage of a moth in the Noctuidae (it might be some other caterpillar, but cutworm is a very common situation). The mosquito netting suggested by Kulvir is an excellent idea. Insecticides could be used, but they might affect your experimental results. The netting will reduce sunlight. Usually it is not enough to cause problems, but that depends a great deal on your research question. You can get fancier, make a cage with netting on all sides and a clear plastic roof. Be careful about the ground. cutworms hide in cracks in the soil, and are experts at finding or making a hole in your netting. They also hide in the soil in pots. It might help to build a table. The legs of the table can be put into small cans of oil or talc powder or soap. Alternatively put something like tanglefoot on the legs. Then the cage can go on the table, and the new plants in the cage. If you use old plants, you might be bringing the pest with you.
Thank you for all the suggestions. Deeply appreciate.
The experiment is on a terrace with concrete floor. There is a bamboo structure wrapped with green net on all sides and transparent plastic on top sloping roof.
Inside this structure, I have placed this cage in above photographs. The experiment is to test effect of soil conditioner on crop growth, yield and nutrient uptake. So using insecticide uniformly is possible without affecting objectives.
There are some other cultivation (terrace garden) plots beside the shed-net which might be the source for these worms.
I am aware that Soil within the pot can be the hiding ground. Before starting this Experiment a month back, I had the assistant remove all soil, sort away roots and any worm. However now since this happened again, I am wondering if there is any substance to fumigate the soil and get rid of worms.
Thank you very much
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