A Study on Five Sampling Methods of Parasitic Hymenopterans in Rice Ecosystem

For insect diversity studies to be of value, the sampling methods employed must produce samples representative of the community or taxon selected for the investigation. However, as yet, few evaluations on the variability and effectiveness of sampling methods have been undertaken. The survey was carried out in the rice fields during 2015-16 in Paddy Breeding Station, Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Coimbatore. From this study a total of 1,019 parasitoid individuals were collected. Among six different collection methods employed for sampling hymenopteran parasitoids in rice ecosystem, the yellow pan trap at ground level was found to be the most effective method in trapping the parasitoids (27.2 ± 2.56 parasitoids per day) followed by sweep net method (12.1 ± 1.03 parasitoids per day). The next best sampling method is yellow pan trap erected at canopy level which recorded a mean of 9.2 ± 2.26 parasitoids per day. The other three traps viz., malaise trap, suction trap and light trap were found to collect less number (<1.5) of parasitoids per day.