Integrated management of bacterial diseases of tomato and pepper
2015
Obradović, Aleksa (Faculty of Agriculture, Belgrade-Zemun (Serbia))
Bacterial spot of tomato and pepper, caused by Xanthomonas spp., is a frequently occurring and widespread disease of tomato and pepper. Management of this disease currently relies on use of pathogen-free seed and transplants, elimination of volunteer plants, resistant cultivars, and frequent application of copper-based bactericides. However, these practices are ineffective in regions where hot and humid weather favor development of the disease. Novel technologies, such as application of systemic acquired resistance inducers (SAR) and use of biocontrol agents integrated with conventional practices, represent new quality in plant protection and provide increase in efficiency of the disease management. In order to develop sustainable and integrated strategies for reducing bacterial spot severity, we investigated various combinations of biocontrol agents, including plant growthpromoting rhizobacteria (PGPR), bacterial antagonists, unformulated bacteriophages (phages) that infect the pathogen, and SAR inducers. During three consecutive seasons, application of phages constantly provided a significant reduction in bacterial spot severity compared with the untreated control. Application of SAR-inducer compound (acibenzolar-S-methyl – ASM) significantly reduced disease severity compared to untreated control. However, integration of ASM and phage treatments provided an additional reduction in disease pressure and resulted in more efficient foliar disease control than ASM, phage, or copper-mancozeb alone. Such approach in controlling the tomato bacterial spot pathogen was used as a model in developing similar program for pepper bacterial spot management. Host specific phage strains, isolated from substrates collected in Serbia, were used in integration with other alternative or standard treatments, and resulted in improved efficacy of the disease control strategy.
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