Biostimulants an important nonchemical alternative to pesticides for management of virus disease in Muskmelon

Abstract

BackgroundUse of chemical pesticides for controlling viral disease in different crops leads to the development of various problems, viz. residue in sprayed crop, pest resistance, pest resurgence and environmental pollution. It was necessary to find some products that were environmentally safe. So, during this study, biostimulants, viz. buttermilk, kaolin, vegetable oil, neem oil, horticultural mineral oil and lemon grass oil, were tested at different concentrations for the management of viral diseases in muskmelon.ResultsAmong these biostimulants, spray of buttermilk at 20% concentration was found to be highly effective with minimum % disease incidence (50.8%) and % disease severity (21.3%), followed by kaolin 2%. Other treatments were also found to be significantly effective in the management of viral disease than the control. In addition to disease control, buttermilk at 20% was also found to increase number of fruits per plant (2.2), number of marketable fruits per plant (2.2), fruit weight (983.3 g), chlorophyll content (26.91 mg m−2) and photosynthetic activity (43.80 mg m−2). Similar to buttermilk 20%, kaolin 2% has also been observed to have significant effect on all abovementioned traits.ConclusionAs buttermilk 20% spray was found to increase growth and yield of sprayed plant along with controlling viral disease, it can act as a good alternative for the pesticide spray in future because spray of pesticide majority time leads to residue problem, pest resistance and pest resurgence problem.