ASHLESHA ATRI, RAMANDEEP KAUR AND POONAM
Department of Plant Breeding and Genetics,
Department of Plant Pathology Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana-141 004 (Punjab), India
*(e-mail: ashlesha-atri@pau.edu)
(Received: 12 December 2025; Accepted: 26 December 2025)
SUMMARY
Leaf blight, caused by Drechslera avenae, is one of the most important foliar diseases of oat in North western India. Study aimed to assess the extracts of various botanicals under in vitro and in vivo conditions against leaf blight pathogen affecting oat crop. The study was conducted for two years during the winter of 2021-22 and 2022-23. A total of eleven leaf extracts were evaluated under in vitro conditions, and among them Cymbopogon citratus and Aegle marmelos were found most effective botanicals against Drechslera avenae, exhibiting more than 92% mycelial growth inhibition at 10% concentration followed by Murraya koenigii (91%) and Melia azedarach (88%). Under field conditions, seven botanical extracts were tested and the minimum disease severity (12.90%) was recorded in the treatment A. marmelos as compared to control (43.84%) followed by M. azedarach (18.78%) with 70.57% reduction in disease, and resulted in the maximum green fodder yield of 567.5 q ha-1, representing 41.62 per cent increase in yield over the control (400.7 q ha-1). Thus, these botanicals can be used as one of the management strategies against leaf blight.
Key words: Oat, Dreschlera avenae, plant extracts and antifungal activity