Abstract:
In the development of sericulture, the quality of feed plays a remarkable role for growth and
development of silkworms and ultimately on the economic traits of cocoons. The present study
was undertaken to evaluate thirty two castor accessions for their leaf yielding performance
and suitability as feed for eri-silkworm rearing at Eladale Research Station of Jimma
University College of Agriculture and Veterinary Medicine, South West Ethiopia. Thirty two
castor accessions were evaluated in randomized complete block design. Suitability of the
castor accession as feed for eri-silkworms was evaluated in CRD under laboratory condition.
Bothe experiments were replicated twice. Castor accessions showed significant variation both
at field and laboratory experiment including biochemical composition of the leaves. Among
castor accessions tested, Acc219668 registered 13890.9 kg/ha of fresh leaf yield. Higher
disease severity (48.21%) was recorded on Acc219662/1. In terms of biochemical
composition, higher nitrogen (3.90%) and protein (24.42%) was recorded from Acc219662/1
while high phosphorus (1.99%), fat (1.26%) and moisture (83.14%) content was recorded
from Acc 200361and highest carbohydrate (52.15%) was recorded from Acc200355.
However, high ash (22.9%) and fiber (24.01%) content were recorded from Acc 219647.
Furthermore, significant and positive correlation coefficients were observed between erisilkworm traits and nitrogen, protein, moisture, phosphorus, fat and carbohydrate content of
the leaves. On the other hand, negative association was observed among ash and fiber
contents of the leaves and eri-silkworm traits except for larval duration. Moreover, in
silkworm rearing performance shorter larval duration 17.5 days, higher larval weight 7.6gm
and higher fecundity 351.45 eggs/female was noticed from Acc 200361 while higher
hatchability (96.75%) recorded from Acc201067. In addition Eri-worms fed on leaves of Acc
200361 were found to be superior in terms of cocoon weight (3.55 gm), shell weight (0.51
gm), shell ratio(14.33%) and ERR (98.6%). Therefore, Acc 200361 which was comparatively
the best in its agronomic performance and superior for all eri-silkworms traits was
recommended for future research and development work. Future studies should conduct on
these accessions to see their seed yielding performance and oil quality in relation to silkworm
rearing. In addition, studies should be continue giving more emphasis to multi-location
evaluation of this castor accession to understand how these accessions react to diverse
growing areas.
