Click image to zoom

Animal India

Most of Pyrrhocoridae is a family of insects that are red-colored and are known as red bugs or called cotton stainers because their feeding activities leave an indelible yellow-brownish stain on cotton crops. Like other true bugs, cotton stainers suck fluids from their host plants. The only part of the cotton plant affected by this pest is the flower and the seed capsule or boll. As this develops, the insect thrusts its rostrum between the carpels and sucks fluids from the still-soft seeds inside. Micro-organisms are admitted in the process and may make the boll contents rot or the lint become discolored. Meanwhile, the seeds wither, the fibers may fail to expand and the boll may abort. When the seeds of a host plant ripen and it becomes unsuitable, the adult insects migrate to new host plants of the same or different species. While away from their hosts, they feed on the nectar and fruit of non-host plants and can survive for several days without food. A nymph of Pyrrhocoridae feeds fruit with a saliva-like substance, known as proboscis (rostrum), a long tube-like mouth part by which hemipterans feed, with the help of it the fruit is hanging on Its mouth at Tehatta, West Bengal; India on 15/08/2023. (Photo by Soumyabrata Roy/NurPhoto)

Photo Details

Related Keywords