Taxonomic identification of lepidopterous species of cashew plant in Brazil

Identificação taxonômica de espécies de lepidópteros em cajueiro no Brasil

Insecta; Anacardium occidentale; Thagona postropaea; Stenoma cathosiota; Anacampsis cf. phytomiella

COMUNICAÇÃO CIENTÍFICA

Taxonomic identification of lepidopterous species of cashew plant in Brazil

Identificação taxonômica de espécies de lepidópteros em cajueiro no Brasil

Antonio L. M. Mesquita^I; Vitor O. Becker^II; Raimundo B. Sobrinho^I

^IEMBRAPA/Centro Nacional de Pesquisa de Agroindústria Tropical, Rua Dra. Sara Mesquita, 2270, Pici, 60511-110, Fortaleza, CE

^IIEMBRAPA/Centro de Pesquisa Agropecuária dos Cerrados, BR 020 Km 18, Rodovia Brasilia/Fortaleza,73301-970, Planaltina, DF

RESUMO

Este trabalho relata a identificação taxonômica das espécies de lepidópteros Thagona postropaea Dyar (Limantriidae), Stenoma cathosiota Meyrick (Stenomatidae) e Anacampsis cf. phytomiella Busck (Gelechiidae) que atacam o cajueiro (Anacardium occidentale L.) no Brasil. Tipos de dano, locais de ocorrência e níveis de ataque são citados.

Palavras-chave: Insecta, Anacardium occidentale, Thagona postropaea, Stenoma cathosiota, Anacampsis cf. phytomiella.

Cashew plant (Anacardium occidentale L.) has been one of the major crop in Northeast Brazil with higly social and economic importance. The cashew growing area in Brazil is concentrated mainly in the States of Ceará, Rio Grande do Norte and Piauí (Pessoa et al. 1995).

In the late 70's this crop started its expansion in Northeastern region favoured by Go-vernment financial support. At that time, cashew plantations were established, forming a monocropping system bringing about an unbalanced environment and consequently, favouring the incidence and increase of new pests.

The current literature has mentioned 106 arthropod pests associated to cashew crops [insects and seven mites (Bleicher & Melo 1996)]. Some of them are seasonal pests and occur at local level with no economic importance. Others, are more frequent pests and usually offer a risk to cashew crop. Most of these pests are not well known, specially their biology, behavior, biological and chemical controls and alternative hosts. For some of them the taxonomic identification at species level is still unknown. In this paper three lepidopterous cashew pests species are identified.

Thagona postropaea Dyar (Lymantriidae), called "cashew white moth"was mentioned as a cashew pest in 1959 by Silva (1961) in Fortaleza, Ceará State, Brazil. It was primarily identified by A.M. Costa Lima as T. parthenica (Dyar). Further, A.M. Costa Lima based on information from The National Museum of National History at Washington, DC, concluded that it belonged to a new species. In 1991, a sample was shipped to the second author and identified as T. postropaea Dyar. Cavalcante et al. (1977) already mentioned an attack of Thagona sp. to a blomming cashew plantation over 1,000 hectares in Aracoiaba county, Ceará State, Brazil. This insect is also known as "véu de noiva" and is today an important cashew defoliator in the Northeastern region. The adult is a white moth, 11 mm long and wing span of 25 mm. The larvae are greenwish stressed with a yellow strip on the abdomen dorsum and thorax; the body is covered with long whitish hairs; the last instar is 30 mm long.

Anacampsis cf. phytomiella Busck (Gelechiidae). The nut borer "traça-da-castanha" was detected for the first time in 1982, in São Benedito county, Ceará State. The larva penetrates into the nut through the insertion point of the apple during its early developmental stage. After damaging the kernel, the last instar builds a hole, usually at the upper portion of the nut, for adult escape (Araujo et al. 1987). The attack symptom is usually associated to a constriction at the apple near to the insertion point of the nut. The hole nut index for this pest at Pacajus Experimental Station in Ceará State, during the agricultural years of 1989 and 1990 were 3.97 % and 4.80 %, respectively. This result was obtained from data of 1.7 million nut samples. This pest was also detected in other counties of the Rio Grande do Norte and Piauí States. The adult is about 8 mm long with 16 mm of wing span. General dark gray color; anterior wing with light gray areas. The larvae are brown; the last instar is ca. 12 mm long.

Stenoma cathosiota Meyrick (Stenomatidae). It was first detected in 1990 in the county of Canto do Buriti, State of Piauí. The larvae rasp off the bark of the main stem and branches, with major incidence at the bifurcation points. Larvae protect themselves by weaving a mixture of faeces and threads. When first detected this pest presented an infestation level of approximately 80%.

Literature Cited

Received 26/III/98. Accepted 10/IX/98.

• Araujo, F.E.de, L. de M. Barros, A.A. Santos, J.I.L. Almeida, M.L.S. Cavalcante & L.M.S. Teixeira. 1987. A traça da castanha nova praga do cajueiro no Estado do Ceará. Inf. Soc. Bras. Frutic. 4: 11.
• Bleicher, E. & Q.M.S. Melo. 1996. Artrópodes associados ao cajueiro no Brasil. 2ª. ed. Fortaleza: EMBRAPA/CNPAT, Documentos 9, 35p.
• Cavalcante, R.D., J.C. Martins, F. F. de Araujo & Q.M.S. Melo. 1977. Controle da Thagona sp. (veu de noiva), praga do cajueiro (Anacardium occidentale L.). Fitossanidade 2: 61.
• Pessoa, P.F.A. de P., L.A. de S. Leite & C.R.M Pimentel. 1995. Situação atual e perspectiva da agroindústria do caju. p.23-42. In: Araújo, J.P.P. de & V.V. da Silva, org. Cajucultura: modernas técnicas de produção. Fortaleza: EMBRAPA/CNPAT. 292p.
• Silva, A.G. 1961. Primeira contribuição ao conhecimento bio-cronológico da ocorrência de pragas no Ceará. Bol. Soc. Cear. Agron. 2: 47-50.

Publication Dates

• Publication in this collection
  05 June 2006
• Date of issue
  Dec 1998

History

• Accepted
  10 Sept 1998
• Received
  26 Mar 1998