Effect of Cover Crops and Soil Amendments on Tomato Yield and Incidence of Disease

摘要

Cover cropping and soil amendment applications play an important role for improving crop yield and the sustainability of agriculture. To elucidate their effects on tomato growth and potential in soil-borne disease control, a pot experiment was conducted in a greenhouse with controlled environmental conditions. Three cover crops, sunn hemp, sorghum-sudangrass, and Japanese pearl millet versus fallow were grown and incorporated into the soil together with two soil amendments—biochar and zeolite—as compared with a control (with neither cover crop nor amendment). ‘FL-47’ tomato seedlings were transplanted to evaluate their growth, yield, and incidence of plant disease. The results showed that the treatment of sorghum-sudangrass with biochar (SDSB) improved tomato yield by 44% as compared to the control. The concentrations of potassium (K) and nitrogen (N) in Japanese pearl millet tissues were surprisingly high, which implies a great potential to use this cover crop for environmental benefits, scavenging residual K and N from soil. Regarding plant pathogens, two viral diseases: tomato chlorotic spot virus (TCSV) and tomato yellow leaf curl virus (TYLCV) were observed. Growing sunn hemp, applying biochar alone or combining biochar with either of these three cover crops had a potential to reduce the incidence of these fatal diseases.