DETAILED DESCRIPTION What is claimed is: 1.
A method for protecting emerging sugar beet seeds and seedlings against damping off disease caused by pathogenic soil-borne and seed-borne fungi selected from the genera consisting of Pythium, Rhizoctonia, Fusarium, and Aphanomyces, which method comprises seed treatment with an effective amount of ascospores of Chaetomium globosum.
2.
A method according to claim 1, wherein the protective coating contains an effective amount of 10.
sup.
4 -6.
multidot.
10.
sup.
5 ascospores.
Description:
The present invention relates to a method of protecting useful plants, especially sugar beet and cotton plants, from diseases caused by soil-borne as well as seed-borne microorganisms.
The method comprises providing the seeds with a protective coating which contains an effective amount of fungus spores, in particular ascospores of Chaetomium globosum, mycelium, bacteria or culture extracts thereof.
The invention also relates to the seeds coated with Chaetomium globosum ascopores, and to a process for the preparation thereof.
Seeds shall be understood in the context of this invention as meaning in particular the parts of plants necessary for propagation, for example grains, seeds, tubers, cuttings and shoots.
The germinating plantlet is often attacked by soil-borne pathogenic microorganisms that cause the plants to rot and die, whereby severe damage is caused to agriculture.
Such pathogens are normally controlled with chemical fungicides.
Attempts have also been made to use microorganisms themselves to protect plants against attack by pathogens.
Interesting as such attempts have been, suitable methods have been unable to gain acceptance in actual practice because industrially produced fungicides have proved more effective and easier to handle.
The present invention is based on the surprising observation that it has been possible in in vitro and in field tests to match and even surpass the protective action of seeds of useful plants, especially of sugar beet and cotton, coated with commercially available fungicides by dressing seeds with a coating that contains ascospores of Chaetomium globosum
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