 Plant Diseases in Arkansas
Root-Knot Nematodes on Tomatoes
(2 minutes: 26 seconds)
WMV (high speed video)
(2 minutes: 26 seconds)
WMV (dial-up
video)
(2 minutes: 26 seconds)
 WAV (audio
only)
Audio/Video Script:
Dr. Stephen Vann
Assistant Professor - Urban Extension Plant Pathologist
A significant disease that can often attack many home gardeners' tomatoes is
root knot nematode. And these are actually small animals, these are worms that
spend at least part of their life cycle in the soil. So they are going to damage
our tomato plants by actually feeding on the root systems. Enough nematodes
feeding on the roots can cause real problems for the tomato grower.
One of the favorite practices of many home gardeners is to actually grow
marigolds in association with their tomatoes. Because there is plenty of
information and literature that would indicate that marigolds actually have the
ability to repel many of our root knot nematodes. And we have a very nice fact
sheet located on our Extension website that will outline the different varieties
of marigolds that are available to the home gardener.
But essentially the nematodes, as I mentioned, are going to be feeding on the
roots of our tomato plant. And as the numbers increase, these nematodes will
actually debilitate the root systems. So how do you know if you've got root
knot? The best way to do that is to collect an appropriate soil sample, carry it
in to your local Extension office and they can have it analyzed to see whether or
not, for #1, whether or not you've got root knot nematodes in that soil sample
and #2, how many you have. Because with root knot, like many other
nematodes, it's all about numbers. A small number of nematodes feeding on the
root system of our tomato plants may not produce any visible effects, but as the
numbers increase, we're going to start running into problems. The plant is going
to start to wilt, it's going to start to yellow, and eventually it could die.
Now typically we do see more nematode problems in soils that have quite a bit
of sand in the soil, as opposed to those soils that have a lot of clay. So if
you've got a sandy garden spot, you may want to be on the lookout for root knot
nematodes, which could cause quite a few problems.
Announcer
To learn more,
contact your county Extension agent, and follow the links in this section.
Related Link:
Back to
Plant Diseases
|
