Susceptibility of spring barley varieties to fungal diseases and their economic value under chemical control

Abstract

Studies on disease susceptibility of spring barley varieties important for the Lithuanian market were carried out at the Department of Plant Pathology and Protection of the Institute of Agriculture, Lithuanian Research Centre for Agriculture and Forestry in 2017–2019. The study is aimed to compare susceptibility of spring barley varieties grown in Lithuania to fungal diseases. The experiment was installed in a two-lane block: one lane was sprayed with fungicides and other lane was sprayed with fungicides two times. During the study years, powdery mildew, net blotch, spot blotch, ramularia leaf spot and leaf rust occurred in spring barley. Powdery mildew was the most prevalent in the variety ‘Grace’ – the AUDPC index of powdery mildew was on average 186.17, while in the least damaged variety, ‘Rusnė DS’, it averaged 0.48. The intensity of net blotch in the variety ‘RGT Planet’ was 1.38%, several times higher compared to that of the most resistant variety ‘Ema DS’ – 0.30%. The average intensity of spot blotch was 2% in the variety ‘Propino’, which was the most severely affected, and only 0.24% in the least affected variety ‘Luokė’. The application of fungicides resulted in the highest yield increase (1 t ha^–1) in the spring barley variety ‘Luokė’.