author(s)
Manjappa, Seema Bara, Immanual Gilwax Prabhu, Mohammad Muzeruddin Baig and Alok Sahay

abstract
Continuous rearing of tasar silkworm on same Arjun plantations has led to decrease in silkworm commercial characters owing to depleting leaf nutrient quality. Plantations rarely receive manures due to poor economic status of tribal farmers. Considering the presence of vital nutrients and high anti-nutritional factors in Shorea robusta (Sal), nine treatments of Sal leaf extract having different dilutions and treatment duration were applied over Arjun plants. Tasar silkworm reared on treated Arjun plants revealed significant improvement for larval body weight, cocoon weight, pupa weight, fecundity and reeling parameters. Among treatmentsT4 (500 ml extract + 500 ml water, 3 days interval) has significantly enhanced fecundity by 13% over control, besides enhancing larval weight, pupal weight, filament length and silk weight. On contrary, silkworm reared directly on Sal plants shown high larval mortality (95%) and survived larvae spinned cocoons of inferior quality, this was attributed to high level of anti-nutritional factors in Sal. Thus, supplementation of silkworm nutrition through Sal leaf extract is an eco-friendly, feasible and zero cost approach for tasar farmers