Retrofitting microbes for inorganic nutrients in citrus nursery: new perspectives

Nutritional health of citrus nursery is the foundation of quality production of mature citrus trees coupled with extended productive life. Retrofitting microbes for nutrient requirement is one of the novel approaches of not only ensuring good health of citrus nursery but cutting down the intensity of mortality during planting into new citrus field. We attempted to tailor the nutrient requirement of citrus nursery through the microbial consortium (Aspergillus flavus, MF113270; Bacillus pseudomycoides, MF113272; Acinetobacter radioresistens, MF113273; Micrococcus yunnanensis, MF113274; and Paenibacillus alvei, MF113275) developed through extensive isolation, characterization and value addition of different microbial inoculants. The progressive microbial response studies showed that the magnitude of response with microbial consortium outweighed the response of individual microbes with regard to large number parameters, comprising germination percentage, vigour index soil microbial population, changes in available pool of nutrients and leaf nutrient composition, without any additional supplement of inorganic fertilizers. Introducing further the mycorrhizal inoculants, biochars, microbes from rhizospheres of other fruit crops would facilitate towards much better rhizosphere resilience to be fitted in substrate for pre-evaluation of citrus, that could be easily extended to even grown-up orchards as well. With these efforts, we succeeded in retrofitting microbes in place of nutrients to be added from outside sources, synonymous to organic citrus nursery.