The Use of Botanicals in the Management of Plant Parasitic Nematodes

Abstract

Environmental hazards resulting from the use of synthetic chemicals is a major global concern. As such, investigators have risen to the challenge of finding more environmentally friendly alternatives and botanicals have been tested. Used as organic soil amendments, nematicidal activities of dried leaves, seed powders and cakes, tree fibres and green manures have been established. Their use as organic soil amendment is compatible with other cultural practices. Employed as extracts, they could be prepared as aqueous extracts, root extracts or exudates; or they could be extracted with chemical solvents including methanol, ethanol and acetone. They were applied as soil drench, root dip and in restricted cases, foliar. The botanicals are significant in modifying the soil ecosystem and if properly developed, may result in the long awaited ecological alternatives to synthetic nematicides. They may also be implicative in sex reversal in some species of nematodes and effective in manipulating the sex ratio in favour of more males than female nematodes. Consequently, nematode population declines with resultant reduction in damage to plants. Employing botanical nematicides in the control of plant parasitic nematodes would be cheap for the resource-poor subsistence farmer.