Investigation into integrated management of early blight disease of potato in Isfahan

The early blight disease of potato,  Alternaria alternata and A. solani, is one of the worldwide diseases, which occurs epidemically in potato growing areas. Thus, because of the economic importance of potato, in Iran, there is a great need for the management planning to be taken into consideration. Movements toward a sustainable agriculture need to consider the managements which are to be economical, free of chemical hazards, applicable in large scales and adoptable by the farmers. Thus, searching for resistant sources, breeding and cultural practices become important as far as the disease and pests managements are concerned. In this study, with reference to the above scales, the factors including type and date of sowing, irrigation types, genetic sources and chemical controls by few systemic and non-systemic fungicides were assessed against the early blight disease of potato for three continuous years in Freidan, Isfahan, Iran. The results revealed that, almost all the treatments were having great influence on disease reduction with significant effects individually, and in combination. Also, the treatments enhanced the potato productions. Sprinkler and dripper irrigations were very effective in comparison to furrow one respectively. Also, single and double rows had no any considerable effect. Late sowing by a month and or two weeks reduced the disease by 77 and 84 percent effectively and respectively. The resistance sources and varieties such as Diamante, Granola, Maradona, Picasso and Kaiser reduced the disease respectively. In respect to fungicides with lower dosage, Trifloxystrobin (WG 50%) with 250 and 200 g/ha, greatly reduced the disease severity, respectively. Investigation onto the integration of these scales showed that in addition to disease reduction, the integration of various methods of control, resistant source, cultural practices and chemical measurements not only caused the reduction of the cost product, but also, reduced the chemical hazards greatly.