Abstract
The present study aimed at reporting the incidence of exotic pest on Coconut rugose spiralling whitefly, Aleurodicus rugioperculatus Martin in Tamil Nadu, India. The taxonomical, morphometric, molecular characterization, life cycle and age specific life table parameters of the exotic pest were studied on coconut during 2017-19. The results revealed that rugose spiralling whitefly (RSW) is an exotic and polyphagous in nature and had total life period of 56.33± 1.01 days which includes 6.9±0.88, 19.57±2.17, 10.9±0.78 and 26.00±2.34 days of egg, nymphal, pupal and adult period, respectively. The rugose spiralling whitefly male adult was 2.6300± 0.0596 mm in length and 2.1220± 0.0576 mm width and female adult were 3.1460± 0.0329 mm in length and 2.1654± 0.0246 mm width. A. rugioperculatus was bigger than other previously reported whiteflies in India. The operculum was wrinkled and having compound pores with dagger shaped axial pores. Ligula of A. rugioperculatus extended beyond vasiform orifice. The identity of the species was further confirmed through amplification of mitochondrial COI gene 249 bp was obtained for all the isolates which were sequenced. The sequenced DNA product was submitted to NCBI- Gen Bank (Accession No. MT540964, MT679537, MT679538, MT679539, MT679540 and MT682638). Since, it is a first study on the age specific life table parameters of A. rugioperculatus and the results revealed that the net reproductive rates (Ro) 24.08 females/female/generation, intrinsic rate of increase 0.0646/day, finite rate of Increase (λ) 1.066/ day, mean fecundity (F) 41.28 eggs/female and mean generation time (T) 49.25 days, respectively