Establishment of the chickpea wilt pathogen Fusarium oxysporum f. sp ciceris in the soil through seed transmission

Chickpea wilt caused by Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. ciceris (FOC) is the most destructive disease in India. It is seed-borne as well as soil-borne pathogen. The role of seed-borne FOC in introducing and establishing wilt in FOC free soils is unknown. Using seeds of FOC infected chickpea cultivar K 850, we provided an evidence of establishing wilt disease in the FOC free soils within three crop cycles or seasons. In the first cycle, typical wilt symptoms were observed in 24 pots in 41 days after sowing. These 24 pots were used for second and third cycles without changing the soil. These 24 pots were sown with seeds collected from healthy plants of a susceptible cultivar JG 62, one seed per pot and development of wilt symptom was recorded. Wilt symptoms appeared in all the pots 26 days after sowing in second cycle and in 16 days after sowing in third cycle. On selective medium, all of the wilted plants yielded FOC in all the three cycles indicating that the mortality was due to wilt. FOC propagules on selective medium were 172, 1197, and 2280 g(-1) soil at the end of the first, second, and third cycles, respectively. These studies indicated that Fusarium wilt of chickpea is seed-borne and seeds harvested from wilted plants when mixed with healthy seeds can carry the wilt fungus to new areas and can establish the disease in the soil to economic threshold levels within three seasons.