| Infection of wheat seeds with Fusarium spp. causes seedling blight. As a result of this disease, fields sown with infected seeds show a reduced plant density. This is especially a problem in organic agriculture, for which currently no practical seed disinfection methods are available. In the present project we investigated whether spring wheat cultivars differ in sensitivity to seedling blight, whether the possible differences could be linked to cultivar differences in early growth rates, and what size the delay in canopy closure resulting from the plant reductions was. Six spring wheat cultivars (Melon, Lavett, SW Kungsjet, Epos, Pasteur, Thasos), containing three infection levels (averages 5, 15 and 27%) of Fusarium culmorum were obtained and were sown... |
