home    about    browse    search    latest    help 
Login | Create Account

Development of disease-suppressive organic growing media

Fuchs, J. G.; Hedrich, T.; Hofer, V.; Koller, M.; Oberhaensli, T.; Ribera Regal, J.; Tamm, L.; Thuerig, B.; Schwarze, F.W.M.R. and Herforth-Rahmé, J. (2017) Development of disease-suppressive organic growing media. Acta Horticulturae, 1164, pp. 181-188.

[thumbnail of fuchs_etal_2017_actaHortic_Vol1164_p181-188.pdf] PDF - English
Limited to [Depositor and staff only]

727kB

Document available online at: http://www.actahort.org/books/1164/1164_23.htm


Summary

Vigorous seedlings are an important base for vegetable production. Beside the availability of appropriate amounts of nutrients, the health of seedlings is decisive. Soil-borne diseases are a challenging problem in organic seedling production. Here, we present results on the development of disease-suppressive growing media. Three aspects were examined: (i) use of different components of growing media (peat, coconut fiber, wood fiber, compost), (ii) influence of selected organic nitrogen fertilizers and (iii) use of different microorganisms (including commercial biocontrol agents (BCA)). Three plant-pathogen systems were used in this study: cucumber-Pythium ultimum, cress-Pythium ultimum and basil-Rhizoctonia solani. Green waste compost showed a good capability to protect cress against P. ultimum. This effect was improved by using a chitin-containing N-fertilizer. However, an inappropriate storage of the compost diminished its efficacy. In contrast to coconut fibers, wood fibers showed a suppressive activity against P. ultimum when used as partial substitutes of peat. None of five tested commercial BCAs could improve the suppressiveness of the substrates against P. ultimum. However, one of newly tested strains of Trichoderma sp. was very suppressive against P. ultimum. The tested growing media showed only small differences in suppressiveness against R. solani on basil. In contrast, two of the new strains of Trichoderma sp., which were intermediately active against P. ultimum, could efficiently protect basil against R. solani. At the moment, we test combinations of different Trichoderma strains, compost, different types of peat and peat substitutes. The aim is to determine whether it is feasible to manufacture growing media which allow the production of healthy and robust seedlings also in the presence of high levels of pathogens.


EPrint Type:Journal paper
Type of presentation:Paper
Keywords:Department of Crop Sciences, Crop Protection, pathology, disease suppression, growing media, Rhizoctonia solani, Pythium ultimum, compost, Trichoderma, wood fibers
Agrovoc keywords:
Language
Value
URI
English
growing media
http://aims.fao.org/aos/agrovoc/c_3393
Subjects: Crop husbandry > Composting and manuring
Crop husbandry > Crop health, quality, protection
Research affiliation: Switzerland > FiBL - Research Institute of Organic Agriculture Switzerland > Crops > Crop protection
ISSN:0567-7572
DOI:DOI 10.17660/ActaHortic.2017.1164.23
Deposited By: Fuchs, Dr. Jacques G.
ID Code:33020
Deposited On:20 Apr 2018 10:43
Last Modified:10 Aug 2021 14:06
Document Language:English
Status:Published
Refereed:Peer-reviewed and accepted

Repository Staff Only: item control page

Downloads

Downloads per month over past year

View more statistics