The impact of winter legume and cereal cover crops on rhizosphere microbial communities of subsequent vegetable crops for contrasting crop decline

Publication date: Available online 15 November 2016 Source:Biological Control Author(s): L.M. Manici, F. Caputo, F. Nicoletti, F. Leteo, G. Campanelli Crop decline is a progressive soil health reduction commonly associated to the specialized cultivations. As a series of biotic factors are involved in this phenomenon, it can be controlled with essentially agronomic methods, the impact of winter cover crops on early growth at subsequent vegetable crops was investigated in a two-year field study. Barley and hairy vetch were incorporated into the soil following two mechanical terminations of cover crops (green manure and green mulching). Immediately after, tomato and zucchini seedlings were transplanted and grown for 28 days. The above-ground biomass of the vegetables was taken as indicator of crop response to pre-plant treatments, whilst root colonizing fungi and rhizosphere bacteria were the two analyzed soil microbial components. Root-colonizing fungi were evaluated using culture-based methods, bacteria were analyzed by amplification of rhizosphere soil DNA with 16S rDNA, then processed with PCR-DGGE. Tomato and zucchini growth response after vetch was always significantly higher than after barley regardless of mechanical termination. Rhizosphere bacterial communities differed significantly between cover crops and this differences was maintained also in the subsequent vegetable crops. Root-colonizing fungi differed between barley and vetch, although they shared most spe...
Source: Biological Control - Category: Biology Source Type: research