Dominance of invasive species, Thrips parvispinus (Karny) over the existing chilli thrips, Scirtothrips dorsalis Hood on chilli in the southern states of India with a note on its host range: A likely case of species displacement

Abstract

Recently there has been an outbreak of invasive South East Asian thrips, Thrips parvispinus (Karny), in 2021 reportedly causing 80-100 per cent yield loss to chillies in the southern states of India. Systematic surveys carried out in the states of Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Telanagana revealed T. parvispinus completely dominated the thrips species generally observed in chilli mainly, Scirtothrips dorsalis. Only a small proportion of T. hawaiiensis, T. florum and T. palmi were observed on chilli during the survey period and incidentally not even a single specimen of S. dorsalis was observed in any of the surveyed chilli fields in these states. There is a need to continue the monitoring of the thrips species in chilli, to ascertain the dominance of T. parvispinus over other species like S. dorsalis. and T. palmi, to know whether the present ecological observation of species dominance is temporary or permanent or season oriented. In the chilli ecosystem, apart from chilli, other hosts reported for this invasive thrips are capsicum, black gram, red gram, cotton, beans, mango, coriander, watermelon, bitter gourd, ivy gourd, jasmine are presented in this paper.