Effectiveness of certain safety commercial nematicides compare with a chemical nematicide Carbofuran for controlling M. incognita infected pomegranate plants

Abstract

With the growing environmental awareness, the identification of the dangers of chemical nematicides and the tendency of scientists to use safety nematicides, this study was determined to compare the effectiveness of three safety nematicides : Bio-arc (a commercial formulation Bacillus megaterium ), Mycorrhizae (a commercial formulation of the Glomus mosseae ) and Nemastrol (a commercial formulation of active ingredients) singly or in combination and the nematicide Carbofuran on root-knot nematodes Meloidogyne incognita infected pomegranate seedlings under open field conditions. In addition to its effect on the vegetative characteristics of pomegranate , and the rates of both peroxidase (PO) and polyphenol oxidase (PPO) enzymes in the roots of the pomegranate plants. Results show that, there are significant differences among all treatments. Nematicide Carbofuran gave the highest reduction percentages of M. incognita juvenile (83.0%), superior to that of safety commercial nematicides singly recording 66.4%, 64.3% and 60.3% for Nemastrol , Mycorrhizae and Bio-arc, respectively , compared to the control. M. slightly more reduced the mature females, egg masses and root galls by (83.1, 86.1 and 80.0%) respectively, compared to Carbofuran (81.1, 85.0 and 80.0%) respectively. Binary treatments also improved the vegetative characteristics of pomegranate seedlings compared with Carbofuran, as it led to an increase in plant height, shoot weight and root weight by percentages 56.8, 40.2 and 87.2%, while it increased by Carbofuran treatment as 52.6, 40.0 and 80.0%, respectively compared with control. As well as binary treatments led to increase peroxidase and polyphenol oxidase enzyme rates by (10.3 and 9.5%) respectively, compared with control. Therefore, it could be recommend use these safety agents in binary treatments in integrated control programs for controlling root-knot nematodes that infect pomegranate plants because their greater effect than individually treatment producing better results than chemical nematicide.