Effects of vermicompost, vermicompost tea and a bacterial bioagent against Meloidogyne incognita on banana in Egypt

The nematicidal potential of vermicompost (vc), vermicompost tea (vct) and the bacterial bioagent nemaless® was evaluated against meloidogyne incognita infecting banana (musa acuminata) cv. “grand nain” as compared to the nematicide fenamiphos 40% ec under laboratory and field conditions. experiments were carried-out during two successive seasons (2016 and 2017). results of the laboratory tests showed that the toxicity of vct and nemaless® to m. incognita second-stage juveniles (j₂) was increased as their concentrations and exposure times were increased. the lc₅₀ of vct ranged from 30.86 × 10³ to 83.77 × 10⁵ mg/l, while the lc₅₀ of nemaless® ranged from 2.69 × 10⁸ to 3.17 × 10⁸ cell/ml. results from the field experiments revealed that all of the tested treatments greatly suppressed (p ≤ 0.05) the numbers of galls, egg-masses and nematode final populations. the most potent materials in reducing the numbers of m. incognita in banana soil, in a descending order, were: fenamiphos, nemaless®, vermicompost and vermicompost tea (vct).