Plant Pathology

Agribusiness 2
Symptoms
According to its
Infected Plant
Parts
a.Root symptoms – Injury to the roots system
often includes yellowing,
stunting, or wilting of above ground parts.
Wash off
the roots when
possible and look for the following:
▪Small discolored or dead areas (fungi)

a.General death of the feeder roots or the

entire root system (fungi)
b.Discoloration of the vascular tissue in
the crown and the lower stem (fungi)

c.Galls on roots (crown gall caused by

Agrobacterium tumefaciens,
fungal diseases such as club rot of
cabbage, root knot nematode).
b. Symptoms on storage organs. It
includes tubers, bulb, and corms.

b.Discolored or dead areas that go deep

into storage organs (fungi, bacteria).
b.Dry rots (fungi)
▪Soft rot
▪Scabby lesions on potato skins (bacteria)
▪Galls on storage organs (fungi, nematode)

b.Internal problems (several viruses or

bacteria, such as ring rot of potato).
c. Seedlings symptoms
▪Seedlings fail to emerge, or fall over and die (damping –off caused
by fungi)
▪Dead areas on cotyledons or stems (fungi, bacteria)
d. Leaf Symptoms
d.Yellowing, discoloration in localized or distinct patterns (viral)
e.Necrotic areas on leaves, often containing fruiting bodies (fungi)

f.Necrotic areas on leaves, often with water-soaked margins

(bacteria)
▪Small rusty-red, brown or black spots and stripes (fruiting bodies
of rusts and smut fungi)
d.Leaf distortion (viral)
e.White powdery substance on leaves (powdery or downy mildew
▪leaf galls (fungi, insects)
▪ wilting (vascular wilt fungi, root rot pathogens, bacteria, )
e. Stems, branch, and trunk symptoms

e.Cankers and complete or partial death of woody stems or branches

(fungi and bacteria)
f.Sticky ooze from trunks and branches (bacteria, mechanical injury,
insects)
▪Large conks and bracket- like fruiting structures on trunks and
branches (wood-rotting fungi)
▪Galls or swelling on lower trunk and/or branches (crown gall
bacterium, white pine blister rust)
e.Witches’ broom or excessive branching (fungi, phytoplasmas)
f.Extreme distortion, enlargement, and flattening of stems or branches
f. Flower symptoms

▪Odd color
changes and/or
distortion
▪Death (virus)
of flower
parts
▪ Individual flowers
or seeds
converted into
masses of black
spores (corn smut)

▪Flowers that are

green and smaller
and more dense than
g. Fruit Symptoms
▪Fruits decay, rots
and superficial
spotting or
russetting (fungi)
▪Discoloration and
malformation
(virus)
▪Discrete spots
fruits or soft rots o
storage (bacteria) n
in
B. Signs of Plant Diseases

Signs refers to the structure of

the pathogen that bare found
associated with the infected plant part.

Ex. of signs are mycelia,

fungal
spores and fruiting bodies, bacterial
ooze, sclerotial bodies, nematodes at
various growth stages plant parts of
phanerogams (parasitic flowering
plants).
C. Plant Disease Diagnosis

Identification of specific plant

diseases through their
characteristic symptom and signs
including other factors that may
disease
be relatedprocess.
to the Correct plant
disease diagnosis is necessary for
recommending the appropriate
control measures, and in plant
disease surveys.
Robert Robert Koch circa
Koch
Koch:’s postulates
1900. are four criteria
designed in the 1880’s to establish
a causal relationship between a
causative microbe and a disease.
KOCH’S POSTULATE

Studies and work that require actual proof of pathogenecity require the
application of KOCH’S rules of proof. Koch’s postulates state that:
•The suspected pathogen must always be present in the plant when the
disease occur
•The organisms which is believed to cause the disease must be isolated
and grown in pure culture,
•The pure culture of the organisms must produce the symptoms and
signs of the disease when inoculated into a healthy plant, and
•The suspected causal organisms must be re-isolated in pure culture
from the inoculated plant and must be identical to
the original
 Classification of Plant Diseases
Identification and successive control of a particular disease is more easily
when we group plant diseases accordingly to its different classification.
•Classification according to the affected plant organ such as root
disease, foliage diseases, fruit diseases and stem diseases.
•Classification according to the symptoms such as leaf spots, rusts,
smuts, anthracnose, mosaic, wilts and fruit rots.
•Classification according to the type of affected plants such as
vegetables diseases, diseases of forest trees, diseases of field crops,
diseases of ornamentals, etc.
•Classification according to the type of pathogen that causes the disease.
Infectious diseases Non-infectious diseases
a.disease caused by fungi a. extremely high or
excessively low temperature
b.diseases caused
mycoplasmas b.unfavorable oxygen condition
c.diseases caused by c.unfavorable moisture
bacteria
condition d.nutrient
d.diseases caused by viruses
deficiencies
e.diseases caused by viroids
e.mineral toxicities
f.diseases caused by f. air pollution
protozoa g.toxicity of pesticides
•diseases caused by parasitic
flowering plant
a.diseases caused by b
nematodes
3. Causes of plant diseases

a. Non-parasitic agents of plant

diseases a.1 Temperature
a. Lack of oxygen
2. Light
3. Adverse meteorological conditions
4. Air pollution
5. Mineral deficiency
6. Excess nutrient element
7. Soil pH
a. Improper agricultural practices
b. Soil moisture
b. Parasitic agents of plant diseases
1. Viroids and viruses as plant pathogens
2. Bacteria
3. Mycoplasma
4. Rickettsias
5. Fungi
6. Nematodes
7. Parasitic flowering plants as plant pathogens
8. Insects as vectors of plant pathogens
4. Variability in plant pathogens
a. Concepts
b. Mechanisms of variations
c. Genetics of host parasite interaction
5. Disease cycle
a. Parts of a disease cycle
5. Types of disease cycles
a. Plant disease epidemiology
5. The elements of an epidemic
a. Analysis of epidemics lation to
7.Inoculum, inoculum survival and inoculation, and pathogen’s entry into
plants
7. Types of inoculum
8. Sources of inoculum
9. Dissemination
10.Survival of inoculum
11.Inoculation
12.Inoculum potential
13.Pre-penetration
14.Ports of entry
8. Colonization of the suscept
8.Colonization by viruses, viroids and
mycoplasma
9.Colonization by bacteria
a.Colonization by fungi
b.Colonization by nematodes
c.Latent infection
 9. Mechanism of pathogenicity and host response
a.Interference with the uptake of water and the inorganic
elements from the soil
b.Interference with translocation with inorganic compound
c.Reduction of plant’s photosynthetic capacity
d.Increase transpiration
e.Changes in growth of the suscept
f.Changes in host reproduction
g.Death of cell and tissues
 10. Mechanisms of disease resistance
a. Defense mechanisms
1. Passive defense
2. Active defense

b. Biochemical/physiological bases
c. Morphological/ anatomical bases
d. Varietal differences
 Quiz 5.
Submission: 10 minutes
before end of class.
“DONE”
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Thank you and See
you on our next
meeting!