SUMMARY :An experiment was conducted to find out variation in isolates of Rhizoctonia solani Kühn collected from six different district of Chhattisgarh,based on radial mycelial growth and sclerotial production. Five isolates of Rhizoctonia solani were grown at different levels of temperature, pH and wave length of light on potato dextrose agar (PDA). It was observed that optimum temperature and pH for growth and scierotial production varied among the isolates.The maximum mycelial growth of all isolates was found at 30°C. At 35°C, only RS-CG-16-04 produced maximum microsclerotia/plate. The optimum temperature for sclerotial production of the isolates RS-CG-16-01, RS-CG-16-05, RS-CG-16-06 and RS-CG-16-07was 30°C and for the isolate RS-CG-16-06 and RS-CG-16-07 was 35°C. The optimum pH for maximum radial growth was pH 8 and closely followed by pH 7 for all the isolates.On an average among all the isolates maximum number of sclerotia was produced at pH 7.White light was most suitable for radial growth and sclerotia formation of this fungus and is closely followed by green and blue light because there was significant difference in radial growth and sclerotia formation of different isolates of Rhizoctonia solani at different colour or spectrum or wave length of light.

Different concentration of four plant extracts viz. neem, garlic, Cassia tora, and ginger extract (10%, 20%, 30% and 40%) were used for testing the efficacy of plant extract against seed mycoflora of okra. In case of treatment with neem extract germination was recorded highest 81.40 % followed by 75.70 %, 62.80% and lowest was 49.28 % in the concentration of 40%, 30%, 20% and 10 % respectively, The seed treated with different plant extract, neem extract was recorded with minimum (29.61 %) frequency of mycoflora followed by Cassia tora extract (32.08 %), ginger extract (32.28 %) and maximum frequency was found in garlic extract (33.53 %). On an average among all the plant extract frequency of mycoflora was highest of Fusarium sp. (15.69 %) followed by Aspergillus flavus (13.77 %), Alternaria sp. (2.57 %), Sterile mycelium (0.89 %), Chaetomium sp. (0.76 %), Curvularia sp. (0.53 %), Nigrospora sp. (0.28 %) and lowest was Rhizopus sp. (0.08%). Memnoniella sp. was not found in all plant extracts treated seed.

No abstract

Okra, Abelmoschus esculentus (L.) Moench, is an important vegetable crop grown mainly in the tropical or sub-tropical regions during summer and rainy season. Hence, it is classified as a warm season crop (National Research Council, 2006). The major okra producing countries in the world include India (6.35 million tons), Nigeria (1.10 million tons), Iraq (0.14 million tons), Côte d'Ivoire (0.13 million tons) and Pakistan (0.10 million tons) (Anonymous 2013). Nutritional profile of okra showed that it contains saturated fats, carbohydrates, proteins, vitamin A, B6, B12, folate, ribofalvin, niacin, pentothenic acid, Vitamin C, and E etc., it also contains magnesium, phosphorous, potassium, zinc,

No abstract