Open Access

Wheat is one of the most important agricultural commodities in Turkey, and the country ranks among the top ten producers in the world. It is a staple and strategic crop, and an essential food in the Turkish diet. Wheat seed gall nematode, Anguina tritici, was the first plant parasitic nematode to be observed and described. Wheat gall nematode attacks plants and move up to the spikes via a film of moisture to affect new grains. Damage and yield loss are dependent on the initial nematode population. Wheat gall nematode cause significant yield losses and affect grain quantity and quality, yet they remain under-researched. Wheat gall nematode is one of the sporadically important pests of cereals particularly for wheat in Turkey. In Turkey, the first documented study wheat gall nematode were from surveys conducted in the mid-sixties. The infestation rate estimates were 0.2% in the Eastern Anatolia, 1.6 to 55.2% in the Western part, 25.4% in the Marmara, 3.6% in the South East Anatolia, and none at Aegean and Eastern Mediterranean region. The yield loss estimates were 0.2% in the Eastern Anatolia and up to 60.0% in Central Anatolia. However a study approximately ten years later, checking in the seed lots of the same region in Central Anatolia, showed the losses of only 0.01%. In 2012, the seed gall nematode was detected in wheat fields of the Thrace region of Turkey. Yield losses in the four wheat varieties Kate-A, Pehlivan, Selimiye, and Glibolu were estimated as 51.3%, 53.2% 56.6%, 59.6%, respectively, with seed infection levels by A. tritici of 21.4%, 20.9%, 24.4%, and 18.3%, respectively. In Turkey, wheat gall nematode has been seen and has constituted losses in areas where seed cleaning systems and certificated seedlings are not used.

Global Wheat Program

INT2918

INT1787