Abstract
ABSTRACT
Farmers are shifting their interest from conventional to floriculture crops. The leaves of floriculture crops remain unused and are often discarded as waste. These wastes are a rich source of industrially valuable compounds with diverse biological activities. In this study, the methanolic extracts of leaf wastes of three floriculture crops, namely,
Chrysanthemum grandiflorum
,
Tagetes patula
, and
Alstroemeria hybrida
, were studied for their insecticidal potential against nymphs and adults of
Aphis craccivora
. The results of the study showed that
C. grandiflorum
extract (LC
50
= 637.49 ppm) exhibited higher insecticidal potential, followed by the extracts of
T. patula
and
A. hybrida
against adult
A. craccivora
. Similarly, nymphicidal bioassays showed that
C. grandiflorum
extract (LC
50
= 1398.36 ppm) was the most active, followed by
T. patula
and
A. hybrida
. The targeted and nontargeted metabolomics revealed the presence of insecticidal metabolites in the studied extracts. Enzyme activity studies of
C. grandiflorum
extracts showed acetylcholinesterase (AChE) inhibition activity, whereas
T. patula
and
A. hybrida
extracts showed AChE induction. Moreover, the studied extracts showed glutathione‐S‐transferase (GST) induction, with
C. grandiflorum
showing the most, followed by
A. hybrida
and
T. patula
extracts. This study advances the field of waste‐to‐wealth by utilizing the studied leaf wastes for the development of biopesticides.