Poster: Diseases of Plants: Crop Loss Assessment
807-P
Effect of root pathogens Bipolaris sorokiniana and Fusarium graminearum on germination and seedling blight in wheat in South Dakota
N. Kaur (1), S. Ali (1), S. Sehgal (1), K. Glover (1), S. Kumar (1) (1) South Dakota State Universty, Brookings, SD, U.S.A.
Bipolaris sorokiniana (Bs) and Fusarium graminearum (Fg) are important wheat root pathogens that effect seed germination and seedlings establishment thus ultimately impact the crop productivity. The objective of this study was to explore the effect of Bs and Fg infested seed on germination and seedlings establishment (blight) of 7 wheat cultivars, Advance, Briggs, Forefront, Oxen, Russ, Prevail, and SD4215 which were planted at Volga, SD in 2015. The treatments included, uninfested + untreated, uninfested + treated with fungicide, infested (Bs) + treated, infested (Bs) + untreated, infested (Fg) + treated, infested (Fg) + untreated. Seed germination and seedling blight data was recorded after the germination for 3 consecutive weeks. Wheat cultivars varied in seed germination and seedling blight to both pathogens; low seed germination (ranging from 35-71%) and high seedling blight (30-65%) was observed in Fg infested seed, whereas, in Bs infested seed the germination ranged 58-100% and seedling blight ranged 0-42%. The cultivars Oxen and Prevail had the lowest (33%) and the highest (71%) seed germination respectively. Also the treatments including the fungicide significantly increased the germination (ranging from 5-44 %) and the seedling blight got reduced in almost all the cultivars.