ASSESSING THE SUSCEPTIBILITY OF SOME VARIETIES OF SORGHUM TO PEST IN BUEA, MONOMODAL RAINFOREST OF CAMEROON

ABSTRACT

Sorghum is a cereal grain plant that is widely grown in tropical and subtropical regions around the world. It is a member of the grass family and is closely related to other cereal crops such as wheat, barley, and corn. Despite the importance of sorghum as a food and cash crop, there is limited knowledge of the susceptibility of different sorghum varieties to pests within Buea. The aim of the research was to evaluate the degree of damage caused by some pest s namely aphids, bird, stem borers and fall armyworm on some varieties of sorghum. Sorghum is believed to have originated in Africa, specifically in the northeastern regions. The earliest evidence of sorghum cultivation dates back to around 2000 BC in the Nile Valley. The research was carried out in at the University of Buea school farm data was collected by the use of a data collection sheath were by data on degrees of damage of the various pest was recorded twice. The experimental design used in this study was that of the RCBD. The result was later on analyzed using Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) software version 20 and graphs were made using Microsoft Excel 2016. Information was sorted, categorized and cleaned in line with the study variables. Result from this study showed that aphids has the highest degree of damage on the various insect pest with the most affect varieties being Maljeri and Musquary species. Maljeri also showed highest susceptibility to stem borers attack with a mean damage of 2.85 on 5. The different varieties showed good resistant to fall army worm thou some varieties revealed significant susceptibility to fall army worm notably Maljeri and Sofra 1 varieties. Results from this study shows that the most susceptible variety to insect pest was Maljeri as it showed high susceptibility to all three insect pests. Birds have the most damaging effect has they destroyed yield. The results suggest that controlling bird damage and aphid infestations should be a top priority for farmers to minimize crop losses and improve yields.
Keywords: Buea, sorghum Varieties, Maljeri variety, insect pest, Birds, insect infestation