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Disease Control and Pest Management

Effect of Aerated Steam on the Red-Rot Pathogen in Sugarcane Stalks. Shaw -ming Yang, Research plant pathologist, U.S. Sugarcane Field Laboratory, Agricultural Research, Science and Education Administration, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Houma, LA 70361, Present address: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Southwestern Great Plains Research Center, Bushland, TX 79012; Phytopathology 69:702-705. Accepted for publication 8 January 1979. This article is in the public domain and not copyrightable. It may be freely reprinted with customary crediting of the source. The American Phytopathological Society, 1979. DOI: 10.1094/Phyto-69-702.

Autoclaved sugarcane leaf-pieces were used to study the viability of Colletotrichum falcatum in bud tissues of sugarcane cultivars Co 290 and CP 65-357 treated with aerated steam and untreated. Aerated-steam treatment (AST) at 51 C for 4 and 5 hr killed C. falcatum in 61 and 75% of naturally infected buds, respectively, and AST at 52 C for 4 and 5 hr killed C. falcatum in 88 and 91%, respectively. Aerated-steam treatment at 52 C for 4 and 5 hr, killed the pathogen in naturally infected leaf sheaths and leaf midribs, stalk borer-tunneled internodes, and inoculated internodes. No more than one bud per stalk was found to have viable C. falcatum after AST of stalks at 52 C for 4 hr. Aerated-steam treatment at 52 C for 4 hr did not affect the germination of buds of CP 65–357, but significantly reduced the germination of buds of Co 290.