Management of Fusarium wilt in banana under coastal Odisha conditions

In Odisha the popular culinary banana variety Bantal suffers much from Fusarium wilt disease limiting its cultivation. An integrated effort has been made in the present experiment for effective management of the disease through a combination of chemicals, biocontrol agents and botanicals. The experiment was conducted at the Horticultural Research Station, Orissa University of Agriculture and Technology during 2013–14 in complete randomized block design. Ten treatments comprising of various combinations of chemicals, biocontrol agents and botanicals were replicated three times. The soil of the experimental plot was medium in available nitrogen, low in both available phosphorus and potash, sandy loam textured with a pH of 5.3. Sucker treatment and soil drenching with biocontrol agents Trichoderma viride and Pseudomonas fluorescens produced maximum pseudostem height (147.40 cm), pseudostem girth (45.67 cm), total number (11.67) and area (4.61 cm²) of leaves and minimum percentage of yellow (23.50) and dead leaves (31.00) in a plant. Due to better control of disease incidence this treatment also resulted in minimum flowering time (262 days) and maximum bunch yield (10.31 kg/plant). Soil application of the biocontrol agents T viride and P fluorescens was also effective in controlling the

disease.