Performance of potato cultivars under different planting spacing in a naturally-infested soil by Ralstonia solanacearum

ABSTRACT In recent years, Brazilian potato cultivars were released, such as BRSIPR Bel and BRS Camila, as alternatives to the imported cultivars, traditionally planted in Brazil. We evaluated the cultivars BRSIPR Bel, BRS Camila and Agata growing under four planting spacing (15, 20, 25 and 30 cm among seeds in line) in a field naturally infested with Ralstonia solanacearum in Brasilia, Brazil. The experimental design was a split plot with four replications, spacing as plots and cultivars as subplots. At 59 days after planting (DAP), the incidence of plants with symptoms of bacterial wilt was evaluated and during harvest, at 116 DAP, total mass of tubers, mass of marketable tubers, total number of tubers, and number of marketable tubers were evaluated. ‘BRSIPR Bel’, ‘Agata’ and ‘BRS Camila’ presented susceptibility levels to bacterial wilt of 20, 30 and 80% of symptomatic plants at 59 DAP, respectively. In response to a higher bacterial wilt susceptibility, ‘BRS Camila’ had the lowest yield. No effect of plant spacing was observed. ‘BRSIPR Bel’ and ‘Agata’ had a higher resistance level in comparison to ‘BRS Camila’, which led to a higher productivity under the evaluated conditions.