Studies on the anatomy of sugarcane moth borers

V. Summary and Conclusions

1. The anatomy of the antennæ of eight species of sugarcane moth borers,viz., Scirpophaga nivella, Chilo zonellus, Chilo tumidicostalis, Chilotrœa infuscatellus, Chilotrœa auricilia, Bissetia steniellus, Sesamia inferens andEmmalocera depressella has been studied and described in details.

2. Well pronounced phenomenon of sexual dimorphism has been observed to be present in cases ofE. depressella (Anerastiinœ-Pyralidœ),Sesamia inferens (Agrotidœ-Noctuidœ) and also to some extent inBissetia steniellus (Crambinœ-Pyralidœ).

3. It has been observed that in species where sexual dimorphism is well pronounced the antennæ are of great diagnostic and systematic value for the identification of those species.

4. The present studies have revealed that the number of antennal segments in a particular species is never constant but each species has its particular range within which the number of antennal segments may vary. It has also been observed that generally the number of antennal segments in males is higher than in the females.

5. The data presented in the above-mentioned two Tables I and II was statistically analysed and it revealed that the difference between both means of all these species except in cases ofS. nivella with that ofC. infuscatellus and that of their opposite sexes was significant at 5% level.