Food utilization and growth indices of tobacco caterpillar (Spodoptera litura F.) reared on different host plants

The present experiment was conducted to find the effect of eight different host plants viz., soybean, castor, moong bean, pigeonpea, maize, cowpea, okra and tomato on the food consumption, growth, digestibility and conversion efficiency of ingested and digested food on various larval stages of Spodoptera litura (Fab.) at the Bio-control laboratory, Department of Entomology, College of Agriculture, Raipur (C.G.) during 2022-24, under laboratory conditions. Among the host plants tested, the food utilization and growth indices of tobacco caterpillar (S. litura) revealed, highest ‘Approximate Digestibility’ (AD), (77.802%), maximum value of efficiency of conversion of ingested food (ECI) (30.232%), highest ‘Efficiency of conversion of digested food into body substance’ (ECD) (39.861%) and highest ‘Consumption Index’ (CI) (3.045%) on castor followed by okra. Overall food utilization and growth indices and consumption index of S. litura was minimum on maize.