Lac Crop Harvesting and Processing
Lac is the hardened resin secreted by the tiny lac insect which thrives on the cell sap of certain host plants. India is major lac producer country of the world and exports lac to several countries. Lac production involves pruning, inoculation, phunki rem
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Lac Crop Harvesting and Processing K.K. Sharma
Contents 7.1 Introduction 7.2 Improved Lac Cultivation 7.3 Processing of Lac 7.4 Chemistry and Composition of Lac 7.5 Quality of Lac 7.6 Applications of Lac 7.7 Miscellaneous Applications References
7.1
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Introduction
Lac production involves pruning, inoculation, phunki removal, harvesting and lac scraping (Mukhopadhyay and Muthana 1962). Farmers perform these operations manually using traditional equipments. The traditional equipments need modification to increase the efficiency and ultimately the production.
7.2
Improved Lac Cultivation
7.2.1 Pruning Lac insect thrives best on tender shoots rather than on old and woody ones. In order to provide a suitable ground for the insect to feed well and thrive upon, the host plants must be receptive and sustainable. For young plants no particular preparation is required to receive their first infection since there is an abundance of tender shoots. K.K. Sharma (*) Lac Production Division, Indian Institute of Natural Resins and Gums, Namkum, Ranchi 834010, Jharkhand, India e-mail: [email protected] © Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2017 Omkar (ed.), Industrial Entomology, DOI 10.1007/978-981-10-3304-9_7
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Fig. 7.1 Pruning instruments
Fig. 7.2 (a) Lac-bearing branches and (b) raw lac, seedlac and shellac
For older plants, however, a process of pruning is required prior to infection in order to stimulate the production of fresh and succulent branches. Ordinarily, branches less than an inch in diameter should only be pruned. The majority of farmers do pruning with axe, and this may explain to some extent the thickness of the branches cut. Proper pruning cannot be done with an axe. If branches of the thickness recommended are cut with axes, they will either break or split. Some farmers use sharpedged knife for pruning which is better than the axe for pruning, but this also lacks perfection. The ideal pruning instruments (Prasad 2011a, 2015) are long-handle tree pruner and secateurs (Fig. 7.1). The long-handle tree pruner is more suitable for pruning. This type of pruner is simple in construction and could easily be made by village blacksmith if he has a sample to copy. There are two types of secateurs – roll-cut secateurs and the French secateurs. The roll-cut secateurs are better and easier to use.
7.2.2 Inoculation The method by which the lac insects are introduced onto a lac host plant is known as inoculation. It involves the simple process of cutting lac-bearing twigs (Fig. 7.2a) from an infected tree a few days before the emergence of the nymphs. A bundle of such twigs known as broodlac is tied to an uninfected tree on which tender new
7 Lac Crop Harvesting and Processing
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shoots are plentiful. Nymphs emerge from the broodlac which settle down on young branches of the tree. In existing practice, inoculation is done manually by climbing on the tree on suitable branches. Thus, the process is slow and laborious
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