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Seed and soil treatments with a natural fungicide product against some fungal and bacterial diseases of vegetables |
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Who saw this article? New!
Author: NECIP TOSUN and HUSEYIN TURKUSAY (Courtesy of Alltech Inc.)
Many vegetable seeds are contaminated with fungal and bacterial pathogens prior to sowing. These pathogens usually only become active when suitable conditions occur. The stages of growth in which bacterial and fungal pathogens are most critical are during germination and early seedling growth. Seed and soil treatment is imperative to control seed-borne and soil-borne diseases of vegetables. Many pathogens overwinter in the form of special structures e.g. sclerotia, mycelia and oospores. These pathogens gain access to the seeds through cracks which occur in the testae during germination.
Rhizoctonia solani and Pythium spp. occur together in most soils and cause damping-off and seedling blight diseases in many plants including pepper, tomato and cotton. A fungicide that will control R. solani will not necessarily control Pythium as these fungi belong to different taxa. Pseudomonas syringae pv. tomato is a seed-borne bacterial pathogen of tomato causing specks on leaves and fruit. There is currently no commercially effective seed treatment available to control this disease.
Seed treatment with a mixture of thiram and alumine dust has commonly been used in practice to control seed-borne diseases; however, poor control of damping-off diseases in seedbeds and the field has been reported over recent years, owing to the dominance of R. solani, drought stress following planting and poor cultural practices.
The use of natural products that exhibit elicitor properties such as Natural Fungicide Product (NFP; Stubble-Aid™), could be useful as an alternative to fungicides to economically control these seed and soil-borne diseases. Under laboratory conditions the minimum inhibition concentrations (MIC) for this product against R. solani was 1 μl/ml, and for Pythium and P. syringae pv. tomato the concentration was 2 μl/ml, the efficacy being >97% (Tosun, 2003). The purpose of this investigation was to find a practical solution to minimize the damage caused by the above mentioned pathogens using NFP as a seed and (or) soil treatment.
Materials and methods
The isolates of R. solani, Pythium spp. P. syringae pv. tomato were obtained from stock cultures at the Department of Plant Protection, Ege University, Turkey isolated originally from diseased tomato and pepper plant materials. The fungicide standard used was Pomarsol Forte 80 WP (thiram) supplied by Bayer Crop Science and NFP (Stubble-Aid™) was provided by Improcrop USA.
SEED TREATMENTS
For the seed treatments with NFP, two different methods were used: 1) seed was soaked in a 10% NFP + water solution for 30 minutes; and 2) 500 g of tomato and pepper seeds were coated with a special polymer and NFP at concentrations of 60 ml polymer and 40 ml NFP, respectively, using commercial seedcoating equipment. Seed commercially pretreated with thiram was used as control.
SOIL TREATMENTS
The soil in plastic trays was watered with an NFP solution (2 L NFP/100 L water) prior to sowing with untreated and treated seed inoculated with bacteria. The trays were treated four times at weekly intervals, using the same solution.
PREPARATION FOR ARTIFICIAL INOCULATION
Fungal inoculum was prepared by inoculating wheat bran in bottles. Once the inoculum had grown sufficiently, artificially inoculated soil media for filling plastic trays was prepared by mixing one part inoculum to 49 parts of peat or soil. One hundred untreated and treated tomato and pepper seeds were planted in the inoculated soil. Each treatment was replicated five times.
For bacteria inoculation, the method was modified from Krüger (1959) and Shoemaker et al. (1976).
The surface of the seeds was sterilized with 1:10 sodium hypochlorite and rinsed twice with sterilized distilled water. Bacterial suspensions were prepared at 6 x 109 CFU/ml. Four gram aliquots of tomato and pepper seeds were infiltrated with 20 ml bacteria solution by using a vacuum pump for 30 min. Untreated and inoculated seeds were sowed in NFP treated soil. All tests were replicated five times.
EVALUATIONS
The evaluations were carried out after 25 days, when the majority of seedlings in untreated pots were recorded as dead. Re-isolations of fungi and bacteria from the diseased seedlings were also carried out using selective media. In the fungal treatments the ratios of germinated and dead/healthy plants in treated trays were compared with those of untreated trays. For bacteria test evaluations, the numbers of spots on the leaves of plants derived from treated seeds were counted and compare to those of plants from untreated seed.
Results and discussion
Isolates of R. solani and Pythium spp. virulent to tomato and pepper plants and P. syringae pv. tomato isolates from infected tomato were used in the tests.
The aforementioned fungal pathogens can cause severe damping off and root rot diseases on many vegetables and ornamental plants resulting in significant yield and economic losses in certain years.
No commercial fungicides are sufficiently effective against them under field conditions. Furrow treatments with special fungicides are not practical or cost effective to growers. Moreover, commercially available seed fungicides are not effective enough to control these pathogens.
P. syringae pv. tomato can cause severe bacterial speck symptoms both in field and greenhouse cultivated tomatoes. Copper compounds only have a residual activity of 7 days and are extensively used.
However their accumulation in the soil and the crop are creating great concern in the public sectors and environmental agencies of many countries throughout the world. There is also growing evidence that copper fungicides will not be registered for use in organic farming in the near future
SEED TREATMENTS
In the tomato experiments the soil surface of most trays was covered with the mycelial growth of R. solani. The results revealed that coating with NFP was not effective against the fungal pathogens under investigation. The mean germination of treated seed was 28% and the ratio of healthy to dead plants was 14:86 (14%). In pepper experiments the mean seed germination was 46% but the survival of plants was an unacceptable 33%.
More promising results were obtained with seed soaked in NFP solution. The mean germination for tomato and pepper seeds was 39% and 54%, respectively. Survival of plants for the two different crops was 31% and 49%, respectively.
Tests with bacterial speck in tomato showed that seed treatment with NFP was very effective against P. syringae pv. tomato. Significantly lower lesion counts were obtained on the leaves of plants derived from seed treated with NFP. The survival of tomato plants was 89%.
In the thiram treatments the percentage germination in pre-treated tomato and pepper seeds was 42 and 55%, respectively. The survival rate of tomato and pepper plants was found to be 38% and 40%, respectively. Thiram was therefore not effective in controlling the diseases caused by the fungal pathogens under investigation.
SOIL TREATMENTS
The most promising results were observed in the tests where NFP was used as a soil drench. No mycelial growth was observed on the surface of the treated soil. Moreover, this application suppressed the development of R. solani and Pythium spp. in the soil.
The mean germination rate for tomato was found to be 70% and the plant survival rate 68%. The results observed in the pepper trials were more impressive, here the mean seed germination was observed to be 77% and the plant survival rate 81%.
In the bacterial speck trials the results were comparable to those in the above trials. Soil drench treatment resulted in tomatoes having 73% less leaf specks than the plants in untreated soil.
Conclusions
In summary, seed treatment with NFP was not effective in controlling the diseases caused by the fungal pathogens R. solani and Pythium spp., but was effective in controlling bacterial speck caused by P. syringae pv. tomato. It is assumed that the bacteria were only on the surface of the seed and not borne internally. If the bacterial pathogen was borne within the seed, the results may have been less impressive. The results obtained in the above study indicate that the use of NFP (Stubble-Aid™) as a soil treatment may be effective on its own or as an integrated measure in controlling soilborne diseases of tomato and pepper, in seedbeds, the greenhouse or field. |
References
Krüger, W. 1959. The control of tomato cancer Corynebacterium michiganence by means of antibiotic. South Africa J. Agric. Sci. 2:195-205.
Shoemaker, P.B. and E. Echandi. 1976. Seed and plant bed treatment for bacterial cancer of tomato. Plant Dis. Rept. 60(2):163-166.
Tosun, N. 2003. Effects of “Natural Fungicidal Product X (NFP)” on some of the most important pathogenic fungi of crops in vitro and in vivo. Presented in Agronomy Session in Alltech International Feed Industry Symposium. Lexington, KY.
Authors: NECIP TOSUN and HUSEYIN TURKUSAY
Department of Plant Protection, Faculty of Agriculture, Ege University, Bornova–Izmir, Turkey
Author: NECIP TOSUN and HUSEYIN TURKUSAY (Courtesy of Alltech Inc.)
(2 Sent)
Who saw this article? New!
 DISCUSSIONS ON THIS ISSUE.
 
| 07/12/2007 |
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necati ozip
Veterinerian/erfa
Konya - Turkey |
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Sayın Necip hocam çalışmanızı okudum.Tebrik ederim.
Saygılarımla Necati Özip Erfa Konya | Answer Checked by Engormix.com  |
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| 07/12/2007 |
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Fred Ridgeway
Ceo, Mrs Corp/mrs Corp
Delaware - United States of America |
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Its mind boggling that science looks to design & create special and complex formula for each problem confronting them.
From my research, there is one formula that covers virtually all these problems and many more- a % dilution of himalayan rock salt in water.
Rock salt is a super sterile environment that does not support any fungus or bacteria, germ or insect.
Now some of you are LOL, and thats ok provided you read this entire document or you will miss it, because you havent researched the Earth from the beginning of time, the foundation and earliest beginnings of the planet when oceans covered many of the landmasses and those not covered supported inland oceans in many locations and regions of the early world and some 100 minerals & trace elements existed.
Now the question arises, why himalayan rock salt?
Simple, it is free of all pollution, and it is the only rock salt that dates back some 250 million years that contains the largest number (approx 84) of micro nutrient minerals & trace elements and these have been so perfectly combined by nature, they are chelated thus providing greater benefits when used in thousands of application situation compared to other types of salt that have been polluted and are limited in their nutrient content because they have been openly exposed to being consumed by plant and marine life, and they do not have chelated minerals.
There's much more.
Himalayan rock salt as a % added to water can be used in all instances of chicken farming to prevent the develpment of H5N1 and many other flu and virus strains prevalent in this industry.
Controlled applications of himalayan rock salt in granule form can also be used to renovate the soil.
At this point some of you will be LOL and discrediting this information, however I want you to ask yourself this one question,
what if this were true?
and,
what if this were true and you did nothing about it?
Today the continued use and accumulation of all other forms of chemicals, pesticides, growth hormones, etc, are threatening the future of every man woman and child on the planet...
And some of you thought AL GORE was off the planet.
Well, he is right about CO2 and Global Warming, and the information presented here is also correct...
As for specific % himalayan rock salt used, you can figure that out just as we have done and continue to do as we approach the next problem that it can be used to solve.
Trust me, himalayan rock salt can be used to solve thousands of problems that we face each day and do it in a healthy way for people, animals, and the environment...
Thank you for reading.
Any questions about himalayan rock salt and its uses?
I'm happy to answer.
Fred Ridgeway, CEO MRSCorp
Its NO ordinary rock salt!
_____________________ | | Answer Checked by Engormix.com |
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| 07/13/2007 |
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Gunay Ozen
Vet/alltech Biotecnology Ltd. Sti.
Izmir - Turquía |
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It is looking great experiment and I hope that they need to continue to work on that area because that is serious problem for Turkish farmers. | | Answer Checked by Engormix.com |
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Article: Seed and soil treatments with a natural fungicide product against some fungal and bacterial diseases of vegetables
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