Management of sclerotinia rot of chickpea incited by Sclerotinia sclerotiorum (Lib.) de Bary

Abstract

Among various biotic factors attributed to low productivity of chickpea, susceptibility to diseases is very important. Amongst different diseases, Sclerotinia rot caused by S. sclerotiorum, commonly called as stem rot or white mold is one of the most important disease. An experiment was conducted to evaluate six fungicides of different groups against S. sclerotiorum under in vitro conditions and further explored their efficacy in controlling the incited Sclerotinia rot under pot conditions. Carbendazimand consortium formulation of carbendazim 12% + mancozeb 63% proved significantly superior over rest of the fungicides tested in respect of inhibition of mycelial growth of the test pathogen and checking of Sclerotinia rot where cent per cent growth inhibition was observed even at lower concentration (50 ppm) and achieved 73.94 and 67.57 per cent control of rot incidence when applied as seed treatment (2g/kg) and foliar spray of 0.1 and 0.2 per cent solution, respectively. Propiconazole was found to be the next in superiority providing 67.41 per cent inhibition of growth at lowest (50 ppm) concentration and gave 61.21 per cent protection against the rot incidence when applied as seed treatment (2 ml/kg) and foliar application (0.1%).