An integrated approach for establishment of new citrus plantings faced with the HLB threat

An integrated approach for establishment of new citrus plantings faced with the HLB threat

Report Date: 04/09/2016
Project: 910   Year: 2016
Category: CLas Bacteria
Author: Charles A. Powell
Sponsor: Citrus Research and Development Foundation

This overall 3 year project was focused on determining the optimum combination of chemotherapy, thermotherapy, and nutrient therapy that can be registered for use in field citrus and control HLB. In this quarter (Jan 2016 to March 2015), we continue to evaluate 1) the effect of Pen and SD on control of HLB disease by gravity bag infusion in the field; 2) the efficiency of effective chemical compounds (Pen, SDX, Pcy and Carv) against HLB disease by gravity bag infusion; 3) the effectiveness of a combination of chemotherapy, thermotherapy and nutrient therapy against HLB in the field trials; 4) the efficacy of the new adjuvants to improve the uptake of antimicrobials. The chemical compounds (Pen and EBI-602) and additional nutrients were applied to the heat-treated citrus for three times by foliage spray, using our optimized nano-delivery system. The preliminary results showed that Pen was the more effective to control Las bacterium than EBI-602. The disease severity index (SDI) decreased by 6% after applied with Pen. The integrated practices (antimicrobial treatment coupled with heat treatment and nutrition fertilization) could decrease the fruit drop by 10~20 %, increase the fruit and juice weight by 3~13 %, and decrease the ratio of brix to acid by 0.2~5.0 %. The preliminary results from the other five antimicrobials (SD, Pen, SDX, Pcy and Carv) applied by gravity bag infusion showed that there were not different in the Las bacterial titers among the treated antimicrobials. Compared to the untreated plants, all antimicrobials reduced the Las bacterial titers, especially PEN. Both SD and Pen reduced the DSI through two years application. In last quarter, we tried to evaluate two new adjuvants (Bio and MF200) for improving the effectiveness of Pen by foliar spray. The preliminary results indicated that Pens formulated in both Bio and MF200 decreased the Las bacterial titers a lots. Ten antimicrobials were prepared in two different concentrations of the nano formulations (0.1 % and 1.0 %) in the greenhouse test. The Ct values kept over 36.o in the PEN-treatment. In next quarter, we will keep our application. Pcy and Carv will be changed application from trunk-injection to foliar spray. One papers has been published in the Crop Protection.


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