Pod Borer of Peanut and Potential Entomopathogenic Fungi for its Control in West Sumatera

Abstract

Pod borer (Etiella zinckenella) is a serious pest on peanuts in West Sumatera since the last four years. The larvae lived and bored on pods under soil surfaces and it is often undetected.  E. zinckenella is very limited reporting as a pest on peanuts especially in Indonesia. We described about pod borer attacking in West Sumatera and as alternative strategic control using entomopathogenic fungi bicontrol agents is  safety and more efective and it will be promoted for controlling of  larvae in pods under soil. The objective of this research were to determine severity of damage of pod borer with survey and  observation methods , and to find out potential entomopathogenic fungi  by in both of baiting and  dilution method. The severity of attacking of pod borer on groundnut was 14 to 70%. Five group of fungi i.e: Metharizium sp, Aspergillus sp, Trichoderma, Fusarium and Paecillomyces were isolated from soil of groundnut’s rhizosphere in  several districts of West Sumatera and they were able to infected of Tribolium molitor 8-30%.