Indian Phytopath. 70 (2) : 262-264 (2017) DOI 10.24838/ip.2017.v70.i2.70758 Influence of sowing time on efficiency of chemical and biological management of anthracnose of cowpea RITU MAWAR 1 * and D.K. BANYAL 2 1 ICAR-Indian Grassland and Fodder Research Institute, Jhansi 284 003, Uttar Pradesh, India 2 CSK Himachal Pradesh Agricultural University, Palampur 176 062, Himachal Pradesh, India *Present address: ICAR-Central Arid Zone Research Institute, Jodhpur 342 003, Rajasthan, India Received: 11 March 2017/ Accepted: 31 May 2017/ Published online: 31 May 2017 ©Indian Phytopathological Society 2017 ABSTRACT: Cowpea is grown in various agro-climatic zones of India for seed and fodder purposes. Anthracnose caused by Colletotrichum dematium (Pers.) Grove is the most devastating and causes substantial yield losses in this crop. Anthracnose severity was maximum in the early sown, while minimum in late sown crop irrespective of all the treatments. In the interaction analyses, all the biological and chemical treatments were significantly superior at Palampur location irrespective of date of sowing. On the basis of pooled average at Jhansi, the disease incidence ranged from 10.5-22.9% compared to Palampur where it ranged from 3.7-22.7%. The influence of sowing date on incidence of anthracnose was significant at both the locations. Early sowing leads to higher disease incidence than late sowing. Keywords: Colletrotricum lindemuthenum, neem seed kernel powder, propiconazole, tebuconazole SHORT COMMUNICATION *Corresponding author: ritumawar1976@gmail.com Cowpea (Vigna ungliculata (L.) Walp) is grown in various agro-climatic zones of India like northern hills, north east, central and north west zone for seed and fodder purposes. The crop is economically damaged by various foliar diseases like anthracnose, Cercospora leaf spot, bacterial and viral diseases (Pandey et al., 2009). Anthracnose caused by Colletotrichum dematium (Pers.) Grove is the most devastating and causes substantial yield losses (Emechebe and Florini, 1997). It often causes severe economic losses under favourable environmental conditions and grain yield losses goes up to 50% (Sharma et al., 2008). Various chemical, biological and cultural approaches have been advocated to manage this disease. However, information on common management approaches for different agro-climatic zones particularly hill and central zone and their interaction with time of sowing was found limited and hard to be traced. Such information will help cowpea farmers to plan time of sowing in order to get maximum effectiveness of chemical and biological management approaches. In the present work, combined effects of chemical, botanical and biological seed treatments and sprays at different time of sowing were studied at Palampur and Jhansi locations. The field experiments were conducted in the rainy seasons (July-October) of 2013 and 2014 at ICAR-Indian Grassland and Fodder Research Institute, Jhansi, and CSK Himachal Pradesh Agricultural University, Palampur. The cowpea seeds were sown at three sowing dates i.e. 15 days before normal date of sowing (D-1 25 th June), normal (D-29 th July) and 15 days after normal (D-3 24 th July) during both the years adopting standard agronomic practices in split- split plot design in 4x3 m plot size with three replications to assess efficacy of chemical and biological control measures against anthracnose incidence. Four treatments comprised of 1. No treatment (Control), 2. Seed treatment with Trichoderma viride + Paecilomyces lilacinus (Trichoxp)@ 5 g/kg seed each followed by two foliar sprays of propiconazole @ 1ml/l commencing from 15 DAS at an interval of 15 days, 3. Seed treatment with tebuconazole 2DS @ 1g/kg seed + Neem Seed Kernel Powder (NSKP, 50 g/kg seed) followed by two foliar sprays of propiconazole @ 1ml/l commencing from 15 DAS at an interval of 15 days and 4. Seed treatment with metalaxyl 8% + Mancozeb 64% @ 2.5g/kg seed + NSKP (50 g/kg seed) followed by two foliar sprays of propiconazole @ 1ml/l commencing from 15 DAS at an interval of 15 days, were taken. Disease incidence was recorded at vegetative and flowering stage at each cut. Data on disease indices were pooled for each location and then for both the locations. Disease incidence data were transformed angularly before analysis to improve interpretability as study has wide range of treatments, location and different sowing dates. The angular transformation of data helps to set the relative conclusion among pooled percent disease incidence at different location and various climatic factors on different sowing dates. Three factors - factorial analysis was carried out to determine the effect of date of sowing, treatment and locations in split plot design (Snedecor and Cochran, 1967).