CSIRO PUBLISHING - Australasian Plant Pathology

Investigations into the seed and mealybug transmission of Taro bacilliform virus

A. R. Macanawai ^A, A. A. Ebenebe ^A, D. Hunter ^B, L. C. Devitt ^C, G. J. Hafner ^C ^D and R. M. Harding ^C ^E

^A The University of the South Pacific, School of Agriculture, Alafua Campus, Apia, Samoa.
^B Secretariat of the Pacific Community, Suva, Fiji.
^C Plant Biotechnology Program, Science Research Centre, Queensland University of Technology, GPO Box 2434, Brisbane, Qld 4001, Australia.
^D Current address: PANBIO Ltd, 116 Lutwyche Road, Windsor, Brisbane, Qld 4030, Australia.
^E Corresponding author. Email: r.harding@qut.edu.au

Abstract

Investigations were conducted into the transmission of Taro bacilliform badnavirus (TaBV) by seed and mealybugs. Seed transmission was investigated by artificially pollinating TaBV-infected taro. Seeds derived from four successfully pollinated plants tested positive for TaBV by PCR. Twenty seeds derived from each pollinated plant were also germinated; 2/80 seedlings showed TaBV-like symptoms and tested positive for TaBV by PCR. Pollen samples taken from TaBV-infected plants also tested positive for the virus. Mealybug transmission was investigated by exposing 51 healthy taro plants to Pseudococcus solomonensis that had been reared on TaBV-infected taro plants. Typical virus symptoms developed on 17 plants between 24 and 36 days after feeding; all these plants, in addition to 13 symptomless plants, tested positive for TaBV by PCR. This is the first report of TaBV transmission by P. solomonensis and the first report of P. solomonensis in Samoa.

Keywords: badnavirus, Pseudococcus solomonensis, Colocasia esculenta.

Australasian Plant Pathology 34(1) 73–76 doi:10.1071/AP04084
Submitted: 15 June 2004 Accepted: 23 August 2004 Published: 22 March 2005