Rice false smut disease: An emerging threat to the paddy growers in Tamil Nadu Raju J.*, Thimmegowda P.R., Shivakumar S.N., Krishnan Sivarama, Elangovan C., Pandey Sunitha, Singh J.P. Directorate of Plant Protection, Quarantine and Storage, Ministry of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare, Department of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare, Government of India, NH-IV, Faridabad, Haryana-121 001, India *E-mail: rajuj.smg@gmail.com
Online published on 27 December, 2023. Abstract Rice false smut (Ustilaginoidea virens (Cooke) Takahashi) is an upcoming major disease in India. False smut is recently emerging as a major Rice disease that was previously considered to have a negligible impact. It is found in two different stages sexual and asexual and both spores can infect the spikelet and lead to the formation of a smut ball of rice grain. In Tamil Nadu, the overall disease incidence (percentage of false smut-infected tillers) varied from 3 to 65 per cent and the overall mean severity of the disease ranged from 29.08 to 36.61 per cent. The highest mean disease severity was observed in the Thanjavur district (36.61%) followed by the Trichy district (30.67%), least mean disease severity (29.08%) was observed in the Ariyaluru district. Among different blocks, the mean disease severity of false smut disease ranged from 4.39 to 58.52 per cent of which the highest mean disease severity was recorded from the Thirumanur block (58.52%) followed by Thanjavur (56.70%), Thuraiyur (54.08%) and least disease severity of 4.39 per cent were recorded from Andhanallur block of Trichy district. Top Keywords Rice, False smut, Ustilaginoidea virens, Tamil Nadu. Top |