Abstract
Soil solarization is increasingly used to control soil-borne pathogens because it is environment-friendly. However, performance varied geographically, necessitating experimental trials before its introduction. This study assessed the effects of solarization on soil-borne bacteria and fungi, growth, and proximate composition of Amaranthus viridis (African spinach) in Lagos, Nigeria. Two raised beds were solarized for six weeks with a transparent and black polyethylene sheet, and a non-solarized (control) bed was equally made. The vegetable seeds were planted and their growths were recorded for four weeks. Soil samples at 15-20cm deep and leaves were obtained for microbiological and proximate analysis, respectively. The mean temperature of transparent xxpolyethylene’s soil was 45.33 oC, black polyethylene (35 oC), and non-solarized (33.50 oC). The mean height and width of transparent polyethylene’s A. viridis were 24 and 3cm, black polyethylene (19 and 2.2 cm), and non-solarized (17 and 1.6cm). The transparent polyethylene’s soil had 3100 and 250 cfu/g bacterial and fungal colonies, black polyethylene (3200 and 1900 cfu/g), and non-solarized (37000 and 1900 cfu/g), respectively. The proximate contents of the transparent polyethylene’s A. viridis were (70 moisture, 10 ash, 4.24 protein, 1.45 fat and 9.94 % fibre), black polyethylene (73.35 moisture, 8.36 ash, 3.1% protein, 1.23 fat, and 6.77 % fibre), and non-solarized (76.09 moisture, 5.91 protein, 3.15 ash, 1.31 fat and 6.75 % fibre). Overall, statistical differences (p ≤ 0.05) existed between the solarized and non-solarized and between transparent and black polyethylene (transparent>black>non-solarized). Thus, solarization could be an effective strategy for controlling soil-borne bacteria and fungi of A. viridis in the area studied.
Highlights
Amaranthus species is a popular group of vegetables that has about 70 members (Alegbejo, 2013)
The solarized soils had lower bacterial and fungal counts (p ≤ 0.05). This result is consistent with Emoghene and Futughe (2011), who investigated the effects of solarization on A. viridis shoot disease and observed that only 5% of the plants in a solarized bed developed the shoot disease compared to 50% of the plants in non-solarized bed
This could explain why the soil solarized with transparent polyethylene had significantly (p ≤ 0.05) lower bacterial and fungal counts than the soil solarized with black polyethylene
Summary
Amaranthus species is a popular group of vegetables that has about 70 members (Alegbejo, 2013). In Nigeria and other subSaharan Africa, Amaranthus is considered the most consumed and traded green vegetable. It is a major source of nutrition in the region and provides income to farmers and market women. Bacterial leaf spot (caused by B. andyopogonis) and leaf blight disease (caused by R. solani) are frequently reported (Uppala et al, 2009) These pathogens are difficult to control because they can remain active for a long time in the host (Panth et al, 2020)
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