In vitro Evaluation of Insecticides, Bio-Fungicide and Bio-Fertilizer for Strategic and Eco-Friendly Combinatorial Seed Treatments in Chickpea

Abstract

Use of seed treatments in Integrated Pest Management of major field crops has increased considerably over the past few years. However, field recommendations are seldom supported by in vitro assays screening the suitability of the pesticides for seed treatment. Hence, the present investigation was undertaken to assess the suitability of three insecticides as imidacloprid (600 FS), fipronil (5 FS) and chlorpyriphos (20 EC) for seed treatment in chick pea as well as to verify the compatibility of identified doses of test-insecticides, along with biofertilizer (Mesorhizobium ciceri @ 25 g/kg seed) and in combination with biofungicide (Trichoderma harzianum @ 4 g/kg seed). Ten treatments were evaluated in insecticidal studies viz. control and three treatments of each insecticides i.e. nine treatments) and eight treatments were evaluated in compatibility study. Based on the results obtained, the authors advocate appropriate IPM-compatible and eco-friendly seed treatment tactics, viz., (1) imidacloprid @ 5 ml/kg + Mesorhizobium, (2) imidacloprid @ 5 ml/kg + Mesorhizobium @ 25 g/kg seed + Trichoderma @ 4 g/kg seed, (3) fipronil @ 5 ml/kg + Mesorhizobium @ 25 g/kg seed, and (4) fipronil @ 5 ml/kg + Mesorhizobium @ 25 g/kg seed + Trichoderma @ 4 g/kg seed. These recommendations may be tested for the field level efficacy and the insecticides tested hereby are essentially termiticides, but recommendations can well be adopted for sucking insect pests for good agricultural practices in chickpea.