Abstract

Stem canker on germinating potato sprouts is often caused by seed-borne inoculum of the fungus Rhizoctonia solani. However, high amounts of freeliving plant-parasitic nematodes have been found in field patches of potato plants with stem canker. Fungicide treatment of the seed tubers can be used to avoid stem canker caused by seed-borne inoculum but it is unknown if nematodes can affect this. To investigate whether free-living plant-parasitic nematodes, the root-lesion nematode Pratylenchus penetrans or a combination of several plant-parasitic nematode genera in a full nematode community, may have a negative effect on the fungicide seed treatment, a pot experiment with seed tubers inoculated with R. solani, half of which were treated with fungicides, was performed. The seed-borne inoculum caused severe damage to the plants, while no fungal damages were observed on the fungicide treated plants. This shows that the nematodes did not affect the fungicide treatment. The probability of black scurf decreased in treatments with a full nematode community, which may be due to the action of fungal-feeding nematodes.

Keywords

Pratylenchus penetrans; Rhizoctonia solani; Solanum tuberosum; Stem canker

Published in

American Journal of Potato Research
2017, Volume: 94, number: 3, pages: 258-265

SLU Authors

• Edin, Eva

  • Department of Forest Mycology and Plant Pathology, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    

• Viketoft, Maria

  • Department of Ecology, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    

UKÄ Subject classification

Agricultural Science


Publication identifier

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12230-016-9561-1

Permanent link to this page (URI)

https://res.slu.se/id/publ/84830