Phenotyping of rice landraces for sheath blight resistance

Abstract

Rice is one of the most important food crops of the world. However, rice production worldwide is affected by various biotic and abiotic stresses. Of different diseases, sheath blight of rice (Rhizoctonia solani) has led to large scale yield losses from last two decades and till now no complete resistance has been identified in rice germplasms for sheath blight disease. Rice landraces are important reservoirs of valuable traits and need special attention. In present study 30 landraces of rice were screened phenotypically by artificial inoculation of colonized typha bits with Rhizoctonia solani following 0-9 SES scale given by IRRI for sheath blight. None of the varieties were shown complete resistance reaction, but only Bangara Sanna was shown moderately resistance reaction against sheath blight disease. Most of the landraces were shown susceptible (15) and highly susceptible (11) reactions, three were shown moderately susceptible reaction against sheath blight.