Effect of dates of sowing and methods of planting on viral diseases of muskmelon Dhkal Manmohan*, Sharma Abhishek1 Department of Plant Pathology, Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana-141004 1Department of Vegetable Science, Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana-141004 *E-mail: manmohan90@pau.edu
Online published on 10 September, 2024. Abstract Virus diseases are one of the major constraints in the cultivation of muskmelon crop under Punjab conditions. For virus disease management cultural control methods viz., date of sowing, methods of planting, crop rotation, intercropping and border row cropping are the most important strategies. During this study different cultural practices viz., date of sowing/transplanting and methods of sowing/transplanting were tested for the management of the viral disease in muskmelon in 2016-17 and 2017-18. Five dates of sowing viz., 5th February, 15th February, 25th February, 5th March and 15th March were tested along with three methods of planting viz., transplanting, direct sowing and tray transplanting. During the study zucchini yellow mosaic virus, cucumber mosaic virus-I and begomovirus infection was recorded in muskmelon crop. Crop transplanted on 15th March had minimum per cent disease incidence of 39.80% followed by crop transplanted on 5th March whereas maximum per cent disease incidence was observed in crop transplanted on 5th February (71.90%) followed by crop transplanted on 15th February (63.90%). In direct sowing maximum per cent disease incidence was observed in crop sown on 15th February (58.40%) followed by crop sown on 5th February (55.00%) whereas, minimum per cent disease incidence was observed in crop sown on 15th March (41.70%) followed by crop sown on 5th March (48.40%). Tray transplantation of plants on 15th March resulted in minimum per cent disease incidence of 35.40% followed by crop transplanted on 5th March (41.80%) however maximum per cent disease incidence was observed in tray transplantation of crop on 5th February (57.90%) followed by tray transplantation on 15th February (52.80%). Least loss in the average marketable fruits and fruit weight was also observed in 15th March and 5th March sown/ transplanted crop. Similar to the pathological parameters late sowing of the crops also positively affected the yield parameters of the muskmelon crop. Top Keywords Muskmelon, Cultural practices, Cucumber mosaic virus, Begomovirus, Zucchini yellow mosaic virus. Top |