• International Journal of Industrial Entomology and Biomaterials
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.265-268
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• 2009

Wild silkmoths can be utilised sustainably in the production of silk as an income for resource-poor rural communities. However, attack by parasitoids and predators affect the quality of cocoons and quantity of raw silk produced. A laboratory experiment was undertaken to quantify the effect of parasitoids' (dipteran and hymenopteran) and predators' (ants) exit and ingress holes, respectively, on silk production. The mean number of shells required to produce fifty grams of raw silk was highest with cocoons parasitised by a dipteran and lowest with unattacked cocoons (but with moths already emerged). Degumming loss was highest in parasitised and lowest in unttacked cocoons, but both were not different from cocoons predated by ants. Shell weight was highest in unattacked cocoons, followed by hymenopteran-parasitised and predated cocoons, with the dipteran parasitized ones being the least. Single cocoon weight was greater in hymenopteran-parasitised and predated cocoons than the dipteran-parasitised and unattacked cocoons. Shell ratio or raw silk, floss and yarn weights were higher in unattacked than parasitised and predated cocoons. The total loss in raw silk attributable to attack by parasitoids and predators ranged between 17.4~31.2%. The results offer baseline information for assessment of economic losses in wild silk farming due to parasitoids and predators in the field.

• Journal of Sericultural and Entomological Science
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.155-160
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• 1971

This experiment was carried out to investigate the cocoon reeling condiditions required to technical balance work on the automatic silk reeling machine. The results obtained were as follows. 1) Reasonable reeling velocity with regard to raw silk yield and to reeling efficiency varied according to cocoon reelability. It was observed to be about 150m/min on good reelability cocoon (850m of nonbreaking bave length), about 120m/min on medium reelability cocoon (650m of nonbreaking bave length) and from 90m/min to 120m/min on bad reelability cocoon (500m of nonbreaking bave length) 2) Low temperature drying of cocoon (T$_3$) improved the reelability of cocoon, but increased the reeling accidance with deteriorating the quality of raw silk more than the control(T$_1$) or high temperature drying of cocoon (T$_2$). No significant difference was observed in its raw silk yield and silk by-product with regard to cocoon drying temperature. 3) Incomplete drying of cocoon (T$_3$) improved the reelability of cocoon, but increased the reeling accidance with deteriorating the quality of raw silk more than the control(T$_1$) or over drying of cocoon(T$_2$). No significant difference was observed in its raw silk yield and silk by-product with regard to cocoon drying degree. It was cocoon drying condition of cocoon was the control(T$_1$) or high temperature(T$_2$) rather than low temperature (T$_3$) in cocoon drying process. Control (T$_1$) or over drying of cocoon (T$_2$) was adequate rather than incomplete drying of cocoon (T$_3$) for the improvement of the quality of raw silk on the automatic silk reeling process. 4) It was found that the reasonable cooking condition of cocoon was optimum cooking with 4$0^{\circ}C$ of reeling temperature or incomplete cooking with 45$^{\circ}C$ of the reeling temperature in the automatic silk reeling of the domestic cocoon.

• Journal of Sericultural and Entomological Science
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.1-26
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• 1975

These studies were attempted to find out the optimum silk reeling system by use of automatic silk reeling machine to increase raw silk yield and reeling efficiency with various silk reelable cocoons. The obtained results are as follows; 1. The mean silk reelability ratio(X)of the Korean cocoons during the last ten years was 61 per cent, beside 64.7 per cent in autumn cocoon and 57.3 per cent in spring cocoon. However, the ratio variation of autumn cocoons was larger than that of spring cocoons. 2. A positive correlation between cocoon filament breaks during its process and silk reelability levels was shown to be significant. The cocoons of both poor and good reelability evidenced "J" shape distribution on the filament break graph by the order of reeling cocoon end. Many bave breaks were found at the inner shell of the cocoons, or in case of poor reelability cocoons. 3. The morphology of broken cocoon ends during the process was classified into A, B, C, D, E and F types, The occurrence of B type was majority, but that of F type was minority among them. 4. In case of the cocoon cooking, H-type ion-exchanged soft water was better for good reelability cocoons, Na and H-type ion exchanged neutral soft water for those of fair reelability, and alkaline (Na-type) soft water for those of poor reelability, respectively. 5. The modification of cooking water by mixing the above different types of water (50％ Na-type and 50％ H-type passed by standard natural water; 75％ Na-type and 25％ H-type passed by hard natural water; 25％ Na-type and 75％ H-type passed by soluble natural water) made higher yield of raw silk with tess breaks of thread. 6, In case cocoon ends groping water included sodium hexametaphosphate as much as 800 ppm. the groping efficiency and raw silk yield of cocoon was improved. The effect was pronounced in case of poor reelability cordons. 7. The most reasonable cocoon cooking and silk reeling condition for automatic silk reeling process were observed to be rather incomplete cook with good reelability cocoons and optimum cook with poor reelability cocoons succeeded by the reeling bath temperature of 45$^{\circ}C$, 8. The reasonable silk reeling velocities were observed to be about 150m per min. for good reelability cocoons, 120m per min. for fair reelability ones and 90 to 120m per min. for poor reelability ones. 9. In order to improve the raw silk yield of cocoons and reeling efficiency, the cocoon stand-by-ratio for reeling should be kept at the level of 40 per cent for good reelability cocoons or at 60 per cent for poor reelability ones beside necessary end found cocoon condition.

• Journal of Sericultural and Entomological Science
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.7-14
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• 1987

Extensive studies were undertaken to analyze the genetic basis of economically important quantitative characters in the silkworm by diallel crosses of four inbred lines differing widely in silk yielding ability. Some differences between the reciprocal corsses were detected in cocoon weight, cocoon shell weight, cocoon filament length and cocoon filament weight in case the parental lines were greatly differenent each other in silk yielding ability. The general combining ability (GCA) varied with the inbred lines and M242, a Chieese sexlimited larval marking variety showed high GCA value in the economic characters, such as cocoon yield, cocoon weight, cocoon filament length and weight, and raw silk percentage. The highest heterosis effect, about 13% to 14% was seen in cocoon and raw silk yield and it was low in cocoon reelability and raw silk percentage with less than 1%. It is advisable to improve highly heritable quantitative characters such as larval duration, cocoon shell weight, cocoon filament length and raw silk percentage by means of selection, and to select single crosses with high heterosis effect for cocoon weight and cocoon yield which show overdominance. Genetic correlation should be considered when more than two characters are targets for improvement and selecting high cocoon shell weight is effective to breed high silk yielding varieties. It is difficult to improve cocoon reelability because of low heritability (0.11) and its negative correlation with cocoon-silk quality.

• International Journal of Industrial Entomology and Biomaterials
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• v.27 no.1
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• pp.131-141
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• 2013

At the interface of reducing agricultural income and increasing unemployment in agrarian economy of rural India, this article summarizes and evaluates the state of mulberry sericulture in northwest India, which includes Himachal Pradesh, Punjab, Rajasthan, Uttarakhand, and Uttar Pradesh. In $11^{th}$ plan period (2007-2012), there was an addition of 6 196 ha (217.09 %) of mulberry acreage at annual linier growth rate of 33.44%. However, total silk production could increase only by 54.64 MT (78.57%) at annual linier growth rate of 15.59 %, due to 43.93% (10.82 kg/ha) reduction in silk productivity at negative growth rate of -13.46%, annually. And now, average raw silk productivity in north-western states of India remains at 13.81 kg/ha, which is lower by 452.93 % (76.36 kg) in comparison to the national average of 100.90 kg/ha. Paper summaries the reasons for increasing cocoon yield gap at farmer's level and discuss the ways and means to increase raw silk productivity to improve the livelihood delivery of mulberry sericulture in northwest India.

• Journal of Sericultural and Entomological Science
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• v.15 no.1
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• pp.27-30
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• 1973

The present research has been carried out in an attempt to obtain fundamental data which contribute to enhansing the accuracy of cocoon reeling test and improving the method of it more effectively. The results obtained are as follows: 1. The standard deviation and coefficient of variation of percentage of reelability and of percentage of raw silk yield to the sample size tended to show a gradual decrease according to the increasing of the sample size. However, the significant differences in the standard deviation and coefficient of variation of percentage of reelability and of percentage of raw silk yield between the different sizes of the samples having more than 300 cocoons have not been observed according to their sizes. 2. The significant difference in the standard errors from percentage of reelability between the samples of 300 cocoons and 400 cocoons have not been observed. 3. The significant difference in the standad errors from percentage of raw silk yield between the samples of 300 cocoons, 500 cocoons and 600 cocoons have not been observed. 4. The significant difference in the standard deviation, the standard errors and coefficient of variation to the length of a bave between the different sizes of the samples have not been shown. 5. From the above result, it is estimated that the optimum sire of the sample for the cocoon reeling test is the 300 cocoons.

• International Journal of Industrial Entomology and Biomaterials
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• v.26 no.2
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• pp.74-80
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• 2013

Three new Multi ${\times}$ Bi combinations M.Con.4 ${\times}$ (SK6 ${\times}$ SK7), M.Con.4 ${\times}$ NB4D2 and Nistari ${\times}$ (SK6 ${\times}$ SK7) were studied in five seasons i.e. during the period of $18^{th}$ June - $12^{th}$ July, $30^{th}$ August - $23^{rd}$ September, $3^{rd}$ November - $2^{nd}$ December, $29^{th}$ January- $2^{nd}$ March and $30^{th}$ March-$25^{th}$ April with one control Nistari ${\times}$ NB4D2 considering nine reeling characteristics along with shell percent and cocoon yield per 100 disease free layings (DFLs) to establish the seasonal effect on all the parameters. Results reveal that all the characters performed well in November-December. Highest yield per 100 DFLs was recorded during November-December in all combinations showing >60 kg yield. Higher correlation of yield/100 DFLs with filament length, non-breakable filament length, denier, raw silk percent, reelability percent and recovery percent was recorded in all combinations of Multi ${\times}$ Bi considered in this study. Variability observed among four combinations indicates the effect of different temperature and humidity of different seasons on expression of different traits. The results indicate that there is significant relationship of raw silk percent with reelability percent, recovery percent and evenness. Reelability percent showed higher correlation with recovery percent. It was observed that neatness was positively correlated with evenness. The overall performance of the newly evolved combinations with regard to productivity and reeling characteristics is discussed emphasizing their utilization at commercial level.

• International Journal of Industrial Entomology and Biomaterials
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• v.8 no.1
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• pp.107-112
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• 2004

The combining abilities in the 5 newly evolved thermo tolerant breeds viz., SR6, SR7, SR8 SR9 and SR10 of silkworm Bombyx mori L. and their 15 hybrids were made in a line${\times}$tester crossing programme. Data were analysed for seven quantitative traits i.e., pupation rate, cocoon yield, cocoon weight, cocoon shell weight, cocoon shell ratio, filament length and raw silk percentage under optimum room temperature $(25{\pm}{1^{\circ}C})$ conditions (In case of high temperature $(36{\pm}{1^{\circ}C})$ stress conditions five economic traits except filament length and raw silk percentage) with 3 widely adapted testers i.e., KA, CSR2 and CC1 as lines (females) and testers (males) respectively. The performance at high temperature and low humidity conditions aye only taken into consideration for selecting the best lines/hybrids. Among the lines SR6 exhibited positive General combining ability (GCA) effects for pupation rate, cocoon yield, cocoon weight and cocoon shell ratio traits, followed by SR7 for pupation rate, cocoon yield and cocoon shell weight and cocoon shell ratio. Among testers, KA exhibited positive GCA effects for two quantitative traits cocoon yield, cocoon weight and CSR2 for cocoon shell weight and cocoon shell ratio under adverse temperature conditions. The hybrid SR6${\times}$CC1 and SR7${\times}$CSR2 exhibited significant positive Specific combining ability (SCA) effects for majority of the traits in high temperature stress conditions of rearing. The better parent value of heterosis(Heterobeltiosis) was exhibited by the hybrid SR6${\times}$CC1 for pupation rate, cocoon yield, cocoon weight and cocoon shell weight and SR7${\times}$CSR2 for all the trails evaluated under high temperature conditions. Based on the results, the lines SR6 and SR7 was judged as best combiners and the hybrids SR6${\times}$CC1 and SR7${\times}$CSR2 can be selected for commercial exploitation in tropical climate.

• International Journal of Industrial Entomology and Biomaterials
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• v.3 no.1
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• pp.31-35
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• 2001

Ten newly evolved bivoltine hybrids of silkworm (Bombyx mori L) were evaluated with control hybrid KA${\pm}$NB4D2 during three seasons of a year for their seasonal performance. Analysis of variance and other statistical methods were employed and the performance was observed in respect of 10 quantitative traits. The results showed significant genotype${\pm}$environment interaction with respect to four quantitative characters viz. fecundity, yield/10,000 larvae, filament length and raw silk (%). Environmental effects were significant for nine characters out of ten characters evaluated. A 105${\pm}$J2 and B${\pm}$NB4D2 were considered as highly adaptable hybrids to local conditions with high mean for maximum characters studied and found suitable to rear in all seasons.

• International Journal of Industrial Entomology and Biomaterials
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.59-63
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• 2003

In the present study, hybrid vigour in terms of heterosis and over dominance of newly evolved bivoltine hybrids and their reciprocals raised from the promising newly evolved bivoltine breeds were calculated for the important parameters like pupation, cocoon yield, cocoon weight, shell weight, shell ratio, raw silk percentage, filament length and neatness. Through there was no significant difference among the hybrids for the characters pupation, cocoon yield and cocoon weight, the magnitude of heterosis and over dominance were varied significantly for these characters. However, significant differences were observed between new hybrids and control hybrid for the characters like cocoon shell weight, cocoon shell ratio, filament length and raw silk percentage. The results indicate that majority of new hybrids have shown higher heterosis and over dominance than control hybrid. The data also indicate that highest mean heterosis of all new hybrids was recorded for cocoon yield followed by filament length. Whereas highest mean over dominance was recorded for cocoon yield followed by cocoon weight. Negative mean heterosis and over dominance were recorded for the trait cocoon shell ratio. Based on the results, the importance of three hybrids viz., CSR2 ${\times}$ CSR4, CSR2 ${\times}$ CSR5 and CSR3 ${\times}$ CSR6 and their reciprocals (CSR4 ${\times}$ CSR2, CSR5 ${\times}$ CSR2 and CSR6 ${\times}$ CSR3) which exhibited significant heterosis and over dominance, for commercial exploitation was discussed.