Antagonistic and plant growth activity of Trichoderma isolates of Western Himalayas

The genus Trichoderma is rapidly growing colonies bearing tufted or postulate, repeatedly branched conidiophores with lageniform phialides and hyaline or green conidia born in slimy heads. 62 isolates of Trichoderma species were isolated from different rhizospheric soil samples collected from different places located in Western Himalayas region. Out of these only two species were found i.e. Trichoderma hazianum and Trichoderma viride. Their efficacy against soil borne plant pathogens like Sclerotium rolfsii, Rhizoctonia solani and Sclerotinia sclerotiorum revealed that only three isolates amounting to 5% of the total collected isolates of this region were found highly antagonist. Among them 5% isolates were found against S. rolfsii, 13% isolates against R. solani, 10% against sclerotium caused above 80% inhibition of mycelial growth respectively. 6% isolates out of twenty seven utilized chitin by more than 80 and 16% isolates consumed cellulose by above 80% and therefore are producers of chitinase and cellulases. 58% isolates produced colonies having cottony texture and 41% produced dark green colonies. Pigmentation as observed from reverse side of the colony revealed that 70% of them did not produced pigment in the medium. Plant growth promotion measured as root and shoot lengths were significantly higher than in control. The maximum root length and shoot length were recorded when seeds were treated with isolates were recorded at Srinagar Garhwal was 4.70 and 4.75 cm out of all the isolates in which isolate recorded from Srinagar no 3 caused maximum percent seed germination which was significantly higher 79.49%.