First Report of Stem Blight on Perilla (Perilla frutescens) Caused by Corynespora cassiicola in Korea

Perilla or kkaennip (Perilla frutescens (L.) Britton), an annual herb of the mint family, Lamiaceae, is used in salads and kimchi and for wrapping sliced raw fish. In September 2007, a disease occurred on greenhouse-produced perilla (cv. Manchu) in Gwangyang and Jeonnam provinces, Korea. Symptoms included leaf blight and irregularly shaped stem lesions approximately 1 to 3 cm long. Plants eventually died. In some greenhouses, 10 to 30%, and occasionally as much as 70%, of the plants were affected. Isolations on potato dextrose agar yielded a fungus with single conidiophores (439 to 656 [average 524] μm long × 6.2 to 11.6 [average 9.2] μm wide) with three to eight septa. Conidia were fusiform, obclavate to subcylindrical, straight or curved, and 30.4 to 180.1 (average 98.2) μm long × 6.7 to 18.1 (average 10.5) μm wide with 5 to 16 (commonly 13) distosepta. On the basis of morphological data and ITS rDNA sequences, the fungus was identified as Corynespora cassiicola (Berk. & Curt.) Wei. (1,2). Sequences of one isolate, EML-COR1, were more than 99% identical to sequences of C. cassiicola ATCC64204 (GenBank Accession No. AY238606) and C. cassiicola (GenBank Accession No. EF490450). In pathogenicity tests, the stems and leaves of two 2-month-old wounded and nonwounded potted plants (cv. Manchu) were sprayed until runoff with a conidial suspension of 5 × 10⁴ conidia per ml. The plants were maintained for 48 h in a humid chamber and then moved to a greenhouse. Symptoms similar to those observed in the commercial greenhouse developed on wounded stems within 10 days. On nonwounded plants, symptoms developed 3 to 4 weeks after inoculation. C. cassiicola was reisolated from these lesions. Control plants (sprayed with distilled water) remained symptomless. The experiment was repeated with similar results. Although C. cassiicola causes blight of cucumber (Cucumis sativus L.), sesame (Sesamum indicum L.), and other crops, to our knowledge, this is the first report of C. cassiicola on perilla. References: (1) M. B. Ellis. Page 372 in: Dematiaceous Hyphomycetes. 1971. (2) J. L. D. Silva et al. Plant Pathol. 55:580, 2006.