Chemical and Non Chemical Seed Dressing for Leafy Vegetable Crops

摘要

Using healthy seeds is a prerequisite in any cropping systems, in order to reduce the further adoption of other disease management strategies in the field during the cultivation. Since seeds are often contaminated, also if at a very low level, by seed-borne pathogens, seed dressing is considered an important method for disease prevention. This is particularly true in the case of seeds of vegetable crops, which very often carry the inoculum of important pathogens. It is well proven with many pathosystems, that a very low percent of infected seeds is able to cause severe losses under greenhouse and field conditions. Seed dressing with chemicals was largely adopted for many decades, because of the availability of effective fungicides, at relatively lowcost and the easiness of the treatment. However, recent restrictions in the registration and use of chemicals, stimulated the re-evaluation of old non chemical methods as well as the development of new ones.This chapter reviews some of the work carried out during the past years in the case of leafy vegetable crops (lettuce, wild and cultivated rocket, lamb's lettuce, chicory, endive, basil, spinach), with chemical and non-chemical measures tested under greenhouse conditions against the most important seed-borne pathogens.