Fungi Associated With Tomato Wilt In The Tropical Humid Lowlands Of Southeastern Nigeria And Preliminary Evaluation For Disease Tolerance In The Crop

Isolations on potato dextrose agar (PDA) showed that the following fungi were frequently associated with naturally infected, wilted tomato plants in Umudike: Fusarium oxysporum, f.sp. lycopersici, F.solani, F.equiseti, F.acuminatum, Trichoderma viride, T.harzianum, Mucor hiemalis, Sclerotium rolfsii, Phoma lycopersici and Rhizopus microsporus. Evaluation of 10 tomato cultivars for disease tolerance indicated that Fusarium wilt, incited by Fusarium oxysporum f.sp. lycopersici, with an incidence of 80-100% and a severity index of 4.0-5.0, was the most important fungal disease of field grown tomato in the area. Pathogencity tests, employing the direct soil inoculation technique, showed that only isolates of F. oxysporum f.sp. lycopersici induced wilting in all tomato cultivars evaluated. KEY WORDS: . Global Journal of Agricultural Sciences Vol.3(1&2) 2004: 59-6