Evaluation of culture media for the growth of Pyricularia grisea causing blast of pearl millet

Abstract

Pearl millet is a staple cereal grown in India. It encounters number of diseases which attack the crop during its growth, cause low yield and economic loss to the peasant ad finally to the nation as a whole. The blast also referred as leaf spot caused by Pyricularia grisea has emerged as a serious disease affecting both forage and grain production in pearl millet. In view of this, laboratory studies were conducted to study the effect of different culture media on mycelia growth of Pyricularia grisea. The fungus grew the best on Czapeck’s dox agar medium (87.1mm) followed by Pearl millet potato dextrose agar medium (86.5mm), Pearl millet potato agar medium (83.0mm), Yeast extract agar (81.1mm) and least mean mycelial growth of the Pyricularia grisea were recorded on water agar (37.7mm), Malt agar (41.0mm), CaCo3 agar (45.6mm) among 16 culture media were tested.