N-HOUSE EVALUATION OF NEW BIVOLTINE HYBRIDS OF SILKWORM, BOMBYX MORI L. UNDER LARGE SCALE TESTING

In the present investigation, an attempt has been made to assess and validate newly developed productive and robust bivoltine hybrids of the silkworm Bombyx mori L under large scale in-house testing as per the farmers practice. The hybrids CSR50 x CSR51, CSR21 DR X CSR28DR and commercially popular hybrid CSR2 X CSR4 were reared in large scale with 200 difls each and evaluated for their rearing and reeling performance. Among the hybrids evaluated, CSR50 x CSR51 is significantly superior in its qualitative and quantitative characters over the other hybrids. The hybrid CSR50 X. CSR51 recorded a significantly higher cocoon yield of 73.321 kg/ 50000 eggs with a cocoon weight (2,097 g), cocoon shell weight (0.485 g) and shell percentage (23.14%), while the control hybrid, CSR2 X CSR4 has 65.613 kg, 1.936 g., 0.445 g and 23.02% of cocoon yield, cocoon weight, shell weight and shell percentage, respectively. The reeling and cocoon uniformity test were also found superior in CSR50 X. CSR51 over the control and the other hybrid tested in the study.