CROP AND WEED PLANTS COMPARED AS HOSTS OF VIRULIFEROUS LONGIDORUS ELONGATUS (DE MAN)

Crop and weed plants were compared as hosts for Longidorus elongatus and the viruses it transmits, raspberry ringspot (RRV) and tomato black ring(TBRV). For the nematode, strawberry (Fragaria × ananassa), grasses and clovers were the most favourable hosts but most of the crop plants were poor or non‐hosts. All the weeds except Agropyron repens supported significantly greater populations of L. elongatus than the fallow controls. RRV and/or TBRV were detected in most of the experimental plant species during, or after, the 15‐wk exposure to viruliferous nema‐todes. The frequency of infection was generally highest amongst the weeds and was usually but not always related to suitability as a host for the nematode vector. The one is therefore not necessarily an index of the other. Feeding by L. elongatus caused distortion or swelling of the sub‐terminal portion of a few roots in many of the plant species tested. On a favourable host at least 12 eggs were produced by a female. Copyright © 1969, Wiley Blackwell. All rights reserved