Efficacy of Some Fungal Seed Dressers in Controlling Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. Cicer on Chickpea under Artificial Infection Conditions

Seeds of chickpea cv. Ghab3 were treated with three fungicides; Oxycure, Topsin and Vitaflo, and infected by Fusarium Oxysporum f. sp. Ciceri at culturing under a glasshouse condition. The results showed that Oxycure (Oxychloride) caused a significant increase in seed germination compared with other treatments, but it could not provide this protection at the post-germination phase, resulting in a significant increase in seedling mortality to 42.1% at 15 days after germination, compared with the other fungicides. In addition, Topspin (Thiophanate-methyl) was an effective protectant at germination stage, and in the seedling one too, since the percent of seedling mortality did not exceed 11.11%, whereas, Vitaflo had the least effect in protecting seeds from fungal infection, but with a significant difference with the positive control, as the percentage of non-germinated seeds was 41.66% and 62.5%, respectively.