Thrips in Medicinal Crops in Korea:Identification and Their Damages

*****Horticultural & Herbal Crop Environment Division, NIHHS, RDA, Suwon 441-440, Korea.**Department of Herbal Crop Research, NIHHS, RDA, Eumseong 369-873, Korea.***Protected Horticulture Research Station, NIHHS, RDA, Busan 618-300, Korea.****Department of Horticultural Crop Research, NIHHS, RDA, Suwon 441-440, Korea.ABSTRACT : Damages of medicinal crops by thrips and identification of thrips species were investigated by periodic sur-veys on major medicinal crops, Platycodon grandiflorum, Schizandra chinensis, Codonopsis lanceolata, Lycium chinense,Bupleurum falcatum, Ledebouriella seseloides, Angelica gigas, Glycyrrhiza uralensis, Liriope platyphylla, Atractyloides sp.,once or twice a month in Suwon, Eumseong, Jecheon, Pyeongchang, Chyungyang from May to October in 2012. Thrips andtheir damages were found at all of the medicinal crops investigated, mostly occurring at early growing stages of each medic-inal crop and causing apical meristem region withered, thereby inhibiting the growth of plants. For species identification ofthrips collected from each medicinal crops, DNA from each individual was extracted and ITS2 and COI regions were ampli-fied by PCR. As a result, Frankliniella intonsa, Thrips tabaci, and Megalurothrips distalis have been identified as dominantspecies on medicinal crops in open field, whereas Frankliniella occidentalis was restricted to Lycium chinense in which pro-tected cultivation. This study suggests that the occurrence of thrips species on medicinal crops seems to be affected by hostspecificity and environmental factors such as cultivation types.Key Words : Medicinal Crops, Thrips, PCR, Identification, Frankliniella intonsa, Thrips tabaci, Megalurothrips distalis