Comparative Protozoacidal Activities of Different Chemical Extracts from Various Parts of three Wood species against Entozoic Flagellates of Heterotermes indicola and Coptotermes heimi | IJB_INNSPUB
By: Naveeda Akhtar Qureshi, Muhammad Zahid Qureshi, Asma Ashraf
Lower termites (Insecta: Isoptera: Rhinotermitidae) are one of the most dangerous pests causing serious damages to buildings, crops or plantation forests. Currently insecticidal use for termite control is reported hazardous for other life forms. However the lower termite harbor protozoa in their gut which aid digestion of cellulose by releasing cellulases. The present study is based on the use of plant extracts against gut protozoa (flagellates) of Heterotermes indicola and Coptotermes heimi to kill termites indirectly. The extracts of bark, sapwood and heartwood of three different plants Eucalyptus camaldulensis, Dalbergia sissoo and Acacia Arabica were obtained in different solvents (water, benzene-ethanol (2:1) and chloroform) by using Soxhlet apparatus and evaluated against gut flagellates of selected termite species in no choice feeding bioessay.
It was found that water extracts of all the woods was growth promoter whereas organic solvent extracts proved to be toxic for termite gut symbionts and demonstrated variable mortality in their population in different parts of the same wood and among the three different plants also. Maximum mortality was shown by heart wood of D. sissoo (P<0.05) in benzene-ethanol extractive which is 15.5% significantly greater than its bark and sapwood. On the sixth day of the experiment, it was 964.6±59.4, 461.6±207.6 and 328.3±33.2 compared with day zero i.e. 6832.1±187.2 fed on filter papers impregnated with 1, 5 and 10% extracts respectively and no significant mortality was observed in control. It is suggested that the plant parts showing toxicity can be characterized and the affective component can be isolated by GC-MS for preparing environment friendly termiticides.
Original Source Of Articles: Comparative Protozoacidal Activities of Different Chemical Extracts from Various Parts of three Wood species against Entozoic Flagellates of Heterotermes indicola and Coptotermes heimi
