Interaction between root-knot and stunt nematodes on tomato

Abstract

The interrelationship between Meloidogyne incognita and Merlinius brevidens was studied in the greenhouse by inoculating tomato seedlings simultaneously and sequentially with the nematodes at two inoculum levels. One species reduced the other or both reduced each other significantly in treatments where one numerically dominated over the other (the combination being 10,000 + 1000 specimens/pot) or where both of them were present at the highest inoculum level (10,000 specimens/pot of each species) in simultaneous or sequential inoculation treatments. The size of adult females of M. incognita and the giant cells was significantly reduced while the male/female ratio of both the nematodes increased significantly in both simultaneous and sequential inoculations.