Isolation and identification of bacteria associated with red palm weevil, Rhynchophorus ferrugineus from Hail region, northern Saudi Arabia

The red palm weevil (RPW), Rhynchophorus ferrugineus (Olivier) is an obtrusive, ruinous pest of date palms, (Phoenix dactylifera) causing critical economic losses in the Middle East including the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. However, relying on insecticides alone for controlling the RPW (R. ferrugineus) can have negative effects on human health and the environment. Natural enemies are considered as the fundamental part of the biological control, which is safe for controlling the RPW. Therefore, knowledge of the natural enemies against the RPW (R. ferrugineus) is an important to create techniques for the integrated pest management (IPM). The present study aimed to isolate and identify the bacterial species associated the RPW (R. ferrugineus) in Hail region during. Adults of the RPW were monthly collected from infested date palm farms in various sites in Hail region. Several bacterial species were isolated from the investigated RPW and the obtained sequences were edited in MEGA7 software and compared to available sequences in the Gen Bank database. The 16S rDNA sequencing showed that bacteria isolated from the investigated RPW were mostly Gram positive and belonged to Proteus mirabilis (33.3%), Klebsiella pneumonia (25%), Serratia marcescens (25%), Staphylococcus sciuri (8.3%) and Providencia rettgeri (8.3%). Overall, the results of this study can be utilized a baseline data for applying the biological control program of the RPW.