This book incorporates several new developments since the publication of the first edition. Use this reference as a guide to the identification and control of tropical plant diseases. Includes special emphasis on molecular biology, genetic engineering, and integrated pest management. Includes new coverage of: Rice, Maize, Sorghum, Root Crops, Cassava, Sweet Potatoes, Legumes, Soybeans, Peanuts, Bananas, Coffee, Fruit and Nuts, Sugarcane, Vegetables, Cotton, Spices, Tobacco, among others.

Handbook of Plant Disease Identification and Management presents the fundamentals of plant diseases identification based on symptomology and management focusing mainly on integrated pest management approach. It discusses a variety of techniques for the diagnosis of crop disease, losses due to crop diseases, and theories behind disease management. It describes how society is constraining the possibilities for management of crop diseases by changing the environment; biologically controlling crop diseases; and the epidemiologic and genetic concepts of managing host genes. This book discusses managing diseases through diverse chemical, biological, and physical methods. It highlights climatic factors affecting crops by creating favorable condition for most of the diseases. This book serves as a complete guide for growers, researchers, and graduate students to understand basics of plant disease identification. It explains the disease cycle for respective crops with favorable conditions promoting disease development. It intends to aid growers in managing diseases and help scientists with future research.

An extensive volume of Sugarcane Diseases and their World Distribution (Vol. I) was published by Elsevier under the auspices of the International Society of Sugar Cane Technologists in 1961. The present volume was intended to be a new edition of the book, but so many changes were required that a new book was needed. Only three chapters have been kept with slight amendments. The other chapters have been completely re-written. In fact with changes in importance of major diseases, four diseases previously treated have been left out; on the other hand, three new topics have been included in the new book, two new diseases and a chapter on sugarcane quarantine. The first chapter gives a brief account of the anatomy, morphology and physiology of the sugarcane plant to facilitate terminology and especially for a better appreciation of the effect of disease on the growth of the crop. Diseases are extensively treated as in Volume I, with a very good description of their symptoms and variation under different conditions and severity, all well illustrated by black and white figures and in a set of colour plates at the end of the book which will prove of valuable help for identification. The causal agents of the diseases are described giving synonyms, cultural characteristics, isolation methods and present knowledge on race variation, an aspect on which there has been quite an advance in knowledge since Volume I was published. New techniques of diagnosis are also given. Advances in research on the diseases over the last 25 years are well covered and supported by an extensive bibliography at the end of each chapter. The book has been edited by people having first hand experience in the field and in research on these diseases. Authors have been selected from among the most knowledgeable all over the sugar cane world, especially with due regard to the importance of the different diseases in their countries. The book should prove of immense value to those concerned with practical aspects of plant disease control in the field: pathologists, agronomists and crop specialists, including consultants, to those concerned with quarantine of the crop, for university lectures and students, and research scientists. In a pre-publication review D.J. Heinz and S.A. Ferreira of the Hawaiian Sugar Planters' Association stated: ``Much has changed and new information generated since the original version of this book was published in 1961. This new edition incorporates most of it, providing both the laboratory and field sugarcane pathologist a complete and authoritative guide to the major sugarcane diseases of the world. It is the best single book available on sugarcane diseases.''

Our capacity to maintain world food production depends heavily on the thin layer of soil covering the Earth's surface. The health of this soil determines whether crops can grow successfully, whether a farm business is profitable and whether an enterprise is sustainable in the long term. Farmers are generally aware of the physical and chemical factors that limit the productivity of their soils but often do not recognise that soil microbes and the soil fauna play a major role in achieving healthy soils and healthy crops. Soil Health, Soil Biology, Soilborne Diseases and Sustainable Agriculture provides readily understandable information about the bacteria, fungi, nematodes and other soil organisms that not only harm food crops but also help them take up water and nutrients and protect them from root diseases. Complete with illustrations and practical case studies, it provides growers and their consultants with holistic solutions for building an active and diverse soil biological community capable of improving soil structure, enhancing plant nutrient uptake and suppressing root pests and pathogens. The book is written by scientists with many years' experience developing sustainable crop production practices in the grains, vegetable, sugarcane, grazing and horticultural industries. This book will be useful for: growers, consultants, agronomists and soil chemists, extension personnel working in the grains, livestock, sugarcane and horticultural industries, professionals running courses in soil health/biological farming, and students taking university courses in soil science, ecology, microbiology, plant pathology and other biological sciences.

paper on sugarcane diseases

A database on all diseases of maize (corn) caused by fungi, bacteria, mycoplasmas, spiroplasmas, and viruses.