This document summarizes several plant diseases including wilt of tomato caused by Fusarium oxysporum, bacterial wilt of tomato, citrus canker caused by Xanthomonas citri, yellow vein mosaic of bhindi caused by a monopartite begomovirus, leaf curl of papaya caused by papaya leaf curl virus and its whitefly vector, black stem rust of wheat caused by Puccinia graminis, and loose smut of wheat caused by Ustilago nuda. For each disease, the causal organism, symptoms, and control methods are described briefly.

1. PLANT
PATHOLOGY
ST. XAVIER’S COLLEGE, RANCHI
(Affliated to Ranchi University, Ranchi,
Jharkhand)
Aroma Aishwarya Barla
Department of Botany

2. WILT OF TOMATO • Causal Organism: Fusarium oxysporum f. sp.
lycopersici
• Spread through: Soil
• Favourable conditions: High soil moisture and
high temperature. Soil with high Nitrogen and
Low Potassium content is favoured.
• Symptoms:
• The first symptom of the disease is clearing of
the veinlets and chlorosis of the leaves.
• The younger leaves may die in succession and
the entire may wilt and die in a course of few
days. Soon the petiole and the leaves droop and
wilt.
• In young plants, symptom consists of clearing of
veinlet and dropping of petioles.
• In field, yellowing of the lower leaves first and
affected leaflets wilt and die.
• Growth is typically stunted, little to no fruit
development.
• The symptoms continue in subsequent leaves. At
later stage, browning of vascular system occurs.
Plants become stunted and die.

3. WILT OF TOMATO:
CONTROL
• Removal of infected leaves and Plants
• Crop-rotation with non-host crops like cereals
and other solanaceous crops for 4-5 years to
reduce the inoculum level in the soil.
• Solarization of Soil helps in eliminating pests,
fungi, nematodes, weeds etc.
• Avoid using Fusarium infected seeds. Instead,
use commercially tested seeds.
• Used of resistant varieties. These seed packets
have labels like F, FF, FFF – indicates
resistance to Fusarium varieties.
• Grafting: Graft can decrease susceptibility to
root diseases and increase growth vigor of
tomato. The most widely used for rootstock in
the greenhouse are ‘Maxifort’ and ‘Beaufort’.

4. Bacterial Wilt of Tomato:
• Characteristic symptoms of bacterial wilt are the rapid and complete
wilting of normal grown up plants.
• Lower leaves may drop before wilting. Pathogen is mostly confined to
vascular region; in advantage cases, it may invade the cortex and pith
and cause yellow brown discolouration of tissues.
• Infected plant parts when cut and immersed in clear water, a white
streak of bacterial ooze are seen coming out from cut ends.

5. CITRUS CANKER
• Causal Organism: Xanthomonas
citri subsp. citri (synonym X. axonopodis pv. citri)
• Symptoms:
• Premature leaf and fruit drop
• causes lesions on citrus leaves, stems, and fruit
• lesions are raised and brown, have water-soaked margins, and usually have a
yellow halo surrounding the lesion. Older lesions appear corky.

6. CITRUS CANKER CONTROL:
• Use if citrus canker free
nursery plants
• Pruning and burning of infected
twigs
• Spray copper based pesticides
• Developing canker resistant
varieties
• Neem cake suspension on
infected twigs
• Streptomycin- antibiotic to
control the disease

7. YELLOW VEIN
MOSAIC OF
BHINDI
• Causal Organism: monopartite Begomovirus
• Symptoms:
• Yellowing of the entire network of veins in the
leaf blade is the characteristic symptom
• In severe infections the younger leaves turn
yellow, become reduced in size and the plant is
highly stunted.
• In a field, most of the plants may be diseased
and the infection may start at any stage of plant
growth.
• Flowering and fruiting restricted or formed
poorly.
• Fruits formed are yellowish-whitish

8. YELLOW VEIN MOSAIC
OF BHINDI CONTROL:
• Application of Chlorpyriphos 2.5 ml + neem
oil 2 ml lit of water.
• Seeds of disease free plants should be used.
• Sow disease free varieties such as Punjab-7,
Punjab-8 and Punjab Padmini.
• For the prevention of white fly make
solution of 560 ml of Malathion in 100-125
Lt water and spray it.
• Do not let the wild mint plants grow around
the farm.

9. LEAF CURL OF PAPAYA
• Causal Organism: Geminivirus, papaya
leaf curl virus (PaLCuV)
• Spread: vector white fly (Bemisia tabaci)
• Symptoms:
• Characteristic feature: Severe curling,
crinkling and deformation of the leaves
• Mostly the young leaves are affected
• curling leaves also exhibit vein clearing and
thickening of the veins.
• petioles twisted in some cases
• In severe cases complete defoliation of the
affected plant is observed.
• The affected plants show a stunted growth
with reduce fruit yield.

10. LEAF CURL OF
PAPAYA CONTROL:
• Removal and destruction of the
affected plants is the only control
measure to reduce the spread of the
disease.
• Checking the population of white flies
also can reduce the infection severity.
• Soil application of Carbofuran (1 kg
a.i./ha) at the time of sowing and 4-5
foliar sprays of Dimethoate (0.05%) or
Metasystox (0.02%) or Nuvacron
(0.05% ) at an interval of 10 days
effectively controls the whitefly
population.

11. BLACK STEM RUST
OF WHEAT
• Causal Organism: Puccinia graminis
f.sp. Tritici (Pers.) Erikss. And Henn
• Symptoms:
• eruptions of black-brown pustules in
the stalk, leaf sheaths and leaf called
uredia, uredosori.
• Uredosori soon ruptures, exposing the
brown uredospores which then travel
via wind and infect other nearby
plants.
• Control:
• Use of fungicides like sulphur,
dichlone, zineb, maneb etc.
• New resistant varieties are not much
practical due to emergence of new
physiological races.

12. LOOSE SMUT OF WHEAT
• Causal Organism: Ustilago nuda var. tritici schaf
• Symptoms:
• Appears as characteristic dusty appearance of diseased
heads and complete destruction of spikelet
• Smutted head consists of deformed spikelets, filled
with black dry, powdery mass of spores known as
chlamydospores.
• Glumes and Kernels are completely disintegrated and
soon after emergence the wind blows bare rachis
which is not attacked by fungus.
• Control:
• growing resistant varieties
• Heat treatment of seeds
• Chemical treatment by: carboxin, marimol, carbathin
etc
• Field inspectionand removing infected heads at early
stage
• Using certified seeds