Effect of soil amendments and soil solarization for the management of Sclerotium rolfsii inciting Southern blight of China aster

The management of Southern blight of China aster was done with the use of various organic soil amendments in integration with soil solarization. Maximum mycelial inhibition of 71.95 per cent with no sclerotia production was observed in mustard cake followed by cotton cake (52.29%) in pot culture. The most effective treatments of soil amendments were selected for an integrated disease management trial (2020) for integration with soil solarization which revealed that cotton cake was found to be superior with disease incidence of 16.30 per cent individually and no disease when integrated with soil solarization, which was followed by soil solarization+ mustard cake with an incidence of 33.87 per cent. Thus, cotton cake and mustard cake can be successfully used for the management of S. rolfsii under field conditions at application rate of 125g/m².