Evaluations of Garlic Varieties and Fungicides for the Management of White Rot (Sclerotium cepivorum Berk.) in West Showa, Ethiopia

Garlic (Allium sativum L.) is the second most widely cultivated vegetables next to onion in Ethiopia and mainly produced for its medicinal and nutritional purpose white rot caused by a soil borne fungus (Sclerotium cepivorum Berk.) is a major production threat of garlic where ever the crop is grown. Therefore, this study was carried out to evaluate the effectiveness of fungicides, and garlic varieties against garlic white rot in West Shewa, Ethiopia. The field experiment was conducted at Ambo University, Gudar campus experimental field in 2018/2019 cropping season, arranged in 5 x 3 factorial treatment combination of five varieties namely Holeta, Chefe, Tseday (G-493), kuriftu and local cultiver (as check) and two fungicides namely Pro-seed plus 63 WS and Tebuconazole (Natura 250 EW) along with the untreated control plots in randomized complete block design with three replications. Garlic cloves were treated using fungicides before planting. A total of fifteen treatments were evaluated per replication. Two fungicides were effective in reducing the disease epidemics and improving garlic yield over untreated plots. However, among fungicides used, plots treated with Pro-seed plus was the most effective in reducing the disease epidemics and gave better yield advantage. Pro-seed plus 63 Ws treated plots 57.12 %, 35 % and 64.25 % reduced initial, final incidence and final severity was recorded respectively as compared to untreated plots. The results showed significantly highest marketable yield was recorded from Tseday varieties treated with Pro-seed plus 63 WS (3.047t ha-1) followed by Kuriftu varieties treated with the same fungicides (2.973t ha-1) compared to the untreated control plots. Significantly, higher net profit was obtained from Pro-seed plus 63WS treated varieties compared to Tebuconazole and untreated control plots. Among the garlic varieties, Tseday (G-493) was promising in reducing the disease epidemics and gave better total and marketable bulb yield. Further research should be conducted with the same varieties combinations with fungicides against white rot under multi locations and in different seasons.