~ 328 ~  Journal of Entomology and Zoology Studies 2018; 6(1): 328-332 E-ISSN: 2320-7078 P-ISSN: 2349-6800 JEZS 2018; 6(1): 328-332 © 2018 JEZS Received: 25-11-2017 Accepted: 27-12-2017 Rakesh Kumar Sharma Department of Entomology, Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana, Punjab, India Manmeet Brar Bhullar Department of Entomology, Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana, Punjab, India Correspondence Rakesh Kumar Sharma Department of Entomology, Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana, Punjab, India Status of acaricide resistance in field collected two-spotted spider mite, Tetranychus urticae Koch from vegetable growing areas of Punjab, India Rakesh Kumar Sharma and Manmeet Brar Bhullar Abstract Two-spotted spider mite (TSSM), Tetranychus urticae Koch (Acarina: Tetranychidae), has gained importance in view of their widespread occurrence as a pest on vegetables in Punjab. So far, Scanty information is available on the status of acaricide resistance in T. urticae populations in North India. So the study was conducted in 2015-16 to monitor the magnitude of resistance in T. urticae on brinjal against different acaricides viz., propargite, spiromesifen, fenpyroximate and fenazaquin collected from different vegetable growing areas (Amritsar, Hoshiarpur, Malerkotla and Patiala) of Punjab. Patiala population was least susceptible to fenazaquin (RR 24.65) among all tested acaricides while Amritsar population was found to be highly susceptible (RR 6.67) Among all tested acaricides, fenpyroximate (0.00205 – 0.00954 per cent) was found to be the most toxic against all the tested populations except Malerkotla population. Low to moderate levels of resistance (3.19-24.65 fold) was reported in T. urticae to tested acaricides in Punjab. Keywords: Tetranychus urticae, acaricides resistance, susceptible, monitor 1. Introduction Brinjal, Solanum melongena L. is one of the important vegetable crop which is cultivated in all seasons throughout India. Brinjal is intensively grown in Punjab with production of 82800 metric tonnes [1] . Insects, diseases and mites are the main bottlenecks in brinjal productivity. Two-spotted spider mite (TSSM), Tetranychus urticae Koch (Acari: Tetranychidae) is the most economically important plant-feeding pest mite on the brinjal. This mite has a great potential to produce a high population which depends particularly on temperature, humidity and host plant and these in turn make it one of the most important pests of greenhouses, farms and orchards in different regions of the world [2, 3] . Plant damage results in chlorophyll degradation as well as woven webs with dust accumulation which interferes with photosynthesis in the leaves [4] . There was a reduction in yield of brinjal due to T. urticae incidence [5-8] . More than 550 species of insects and mites have developed resistance to at least one class of insecticides/acaricides [9] . It has been found that T. urticae has the potential to quickly develop resistance to almost all kinds of acaricides because of their high prolific rate, short life-cycle, high reproductive potential, arrhenotokous reproduction, polyphagous feeding habit, coupled with their extremely dispersal behavior [10-12] . The persistent exposure of T. urticae to diverse pesticides in order to contain it below economic threshold has resulted in resistant populations found in more than 40 countries in both greenhouses and field conditions [13] and led to resistance to at least 92 different compounds [14] . Resistance and control failures against T. urticae have been reported for pesticides such as organophosphates [15] , organotins [16] , hexythiazox [17] , propargite [18-19] , fenpyroximate [11, 20] , Spiromesifen [21-22] , fenazaquin [23-24, 6] , and bifenazate [25] . T. urticae can become fully resistant to new acaricides within two to four years, and as a result control of multi-acaricide resistant T. urticae has become increasingly difficult [26] . As a consequence, T. urticae has attained the dubious reputation to be “the most resistant species” in terms of the total number of pesticides to which it has become resistant [12] . Keeping these in view, monitoring the level of resistance in T. urticae populations collected from diverse vegetable (brinjal) growing areas of Punjab towards recommended and new acaricides were planned as scanty information is available on the status of acaricides resistance.