Vol. 8, Special Issue 9, Part E (2024)

Abstract: An experiment was conducted in agro-meteorology field of Central Research Farm, Orissa University of Agriculture and Technology Bhubaneswar (OUAT) during the year 2017-2018 in order to study the population dynamics of yellow stem borer (YSB) in three aromatic rice varieties such as, Geetanjali, Poorna Bhog and Pusa Sugandh –II and its correlation with weather parameters under staggered planting condition with 12 different planting dates starting from 16^th July 2017 to 1^st January 2018 at 15 days interval. Maximum infestation of YSB was found at prevailing weather conditions such as temperature (max.) of 30-38 °C, temperature (min.) of 16-22 °C, morning relative humidity of 88-96% and evening relative humidity of 25-35%. Ample sunshine hours and dry conditions were found favorable for the pest population and the highest infestation of YSB at early stages (i.e. Dead Heart) was found in the 3^rd week of February and 3^rd week of January during the 16^th December and 1^st January planting dates respectively. The YSB infestation at reproductive stage of rice crop was found highest.