Halo Blight of Oats in Kenya

Abstract

The discovery of a bacterial leaf blight of oats in Kenya, attributed to a strain of Pseudomonas coronafaciens (Elliott) Stevens, is reported. Symptoms, isolation and characters of the pathogen, and reproduction of the disease by inoculation are described. Symptomatically, ·the disease is inter.mediate between halo blight and stripe blight. Reasons are given for considering that halo blight and stripe are extremes of a spectrum of syndromes caused by variants of ,the same organism. The importance of the disease in Kenya and its control are also discussed.