Performance of Some Bivoltine Silkworm,Bombyx mori L. Hybrids during Summer

Aim: The present study was aimed to find out the robust hybrid during summer season under temperate climatic conditions.

Study Design: Completely Randomized Design (CRD).

Place and Duration of Study: College of Temperate Sericulture (CoTS) Mirgund, Sher-e-Kashmir University of Agricultural Sciences and Technology, of Kashmir (SKUAST-K), in the year 2014.

Methodology: The disease free layings (dfl’s) of the selected hybrids viz., SK31× SK13, SK6 × SK13 and CSR18× CSR19 were obtained from the Germplasm Bank maintained at College of Temperate Sericulture (CoTS) Mirgund, Sher-e-Kashmir University of Agricultural Sciences and Technology, of Kashmir (SKUAST-K). Thesedfl’s were incubated, brushed and reared up to 3rd instar en masse following the standard rearing procedure. Just after 3rdmoult, 3 replications of 100 larvae in each treatment were maintained. Cocoon and post cocoon parameters viz, pupation rate, single cocoon weight, single shell weight, shell ratio, raw silk, denier and leaf cocoon ratio were calculated and recorded during the course of experimentation.

Results: No significant difference was recorded in pupation rate among the hybrids. H1 hybrid was found significantly superior over H2 and H3 for single cocoon and shell weight with mean value as 1.957 and 0.406 respectively. On the other hand influence of hybrids over shell ratio remained non significant. The performance of silkworm hybrids with respect to raw silk was recorded higher in H1 (17.98%) followed by H2 (17.96%) and H3 (17.93%), while the fine denier of 2.86 d was reported in H3 followed by H1 (2.94d) and H2 (3.01d). Leaf cocoon ratio was recorded lower in H1with mean value as 15.16 /100 dfl’s.

Conclusion: Significant differences among the hybrids were observed, but no hybrid performed better in all traits studied, however in maximum traits SK31× SK13, seems to be superior to the other two studied hybrids.