Leaf Curl Disease: This disease is common in the rainy variety of chilli, capsicum and tomato crop. If the crops are attacked by this disease then there is a major loss in the yield. The leaves of plants affected by this disease don’t grow full in size, slowly their shape starts deforming and later leaves turn yellow or colorless. The growth of affected plants stops and plants remain small size and takes shape of the bush. The affected plants seem to give very little fruit, and if the plant bears fruit then they are very small and irregular in size and in most of the cases plant don’t give fruits.
How the disease spreads: This disease is carried and spread through the white flies, from sick plants to the healthy plants, just like mosquitoes spread like malaria. When the white fly sucks juice from sick plants, then the virus particles move inside the white fly and when the same fly sucks juice from another healthy plant, then the particles of the virus enter into a healthy plant. In this way this disease spreads through the white fly in the whole field. Virus particles can survive inside the white fly for several days.
Prevention: Always take the seeds from disease free and healthy plants only. Uproot all the affected plants visible in the field and destroy them. Generally it has been noticed that many times farmers remove the affected plant from the field, but do not destroy it properly and leave it in the field. It should not be done, but the diseased plant should be destroyed by pressing it in the soil so that the fly cannot suck juice from it.
Department of Plant Pathology, PAU
Contact: 94637-47280
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