Abdul Rahman A. Aba Alkhail
College of Science, Al-Qassim University, Buraidah, Saudi Arabia
ABSTRACT
Three strains of rhizobacteria, namely Azospirillium brasilense, Azotobacter chroococcum and Klebsilense peneumoneae and a commercial product of HALEX® (rhizobacteria mixture) were tested for health and growth promotion of alfalfa plants and for controlling Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. Medicaginis the causal agent of fusarium wilt disease in Alfalfa. In vitro, the rhizobacteria reduced the dry weight of fusarium mycelia by 31.3 to 63.7%, therefore, the highest suppression was achieved by K. peneumoneae and the three mixture isolates. In vivo asignificantdecreaseindiseaseseverity was observed when alfalfa seeds were coated with HALEX®.Thistreatmentalso,increasedtheplantfreshanddryweight. Dry weight increased from 3.31, 2.16, 1.2 to 3.8,2.17,1.76gin noninfected soil with the pathogen and from 1.81, 1.07, 1.01, to 2.45, 1.33, 1.28 g in soil treated with pathogen on Najdy, Hassawy and Max cultivars, respectively. Also, significant increases were observed in the number of root nodules from 74.6, 200.7, 161.6 to 190.2, 301.2, 274.6 in noninfected soil with the pathogen and from 61.0, 185.6, 124.3 to 159.2, 288.4, 251.3 nodules in soil treated with the pathogen but only when seeds were treated withHALEX® and respectively on the tested alfalfla cutivars.
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How to cite this article
Abdul Rahman A. Aba Alkhail, 2004. Testing Biological
Agents and Methods to Control Fusarium Wilt of Alfalfa Plants (Medicage
sativa L.). Pakistan Journal of Biological Sciences, 7: 2208-2211.
DOI: 10.3923/pjbs.2004.2208.2211
URL: https://scialert.net/abstract/?doi=pjbs.2004.2208.2211
DOI: 10.3923/pjbs.2004.2208.2211
URL: https://scialert.net/abstract/?doi=pjbs.2004.2208.2211
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