Evaluation of fungicides, bioagents and botanicals on postharvest disease, shelf life and physico- chemical properties of ‘Alphonso’ mango

The experiment involved pre-harvest sprays of fungicides, bioagents and botanicals at three growth stages of mango fruit cv. Alphonso viz., before the onset of flowering, at peanut and marble stages. In general, pooled data of two consecutive years (2013 and 2014) revealed better performance of fungicides over bioagents and botanicals in minimising anthracnose decay in storage and retaining quality of mango fruits. Azoxystrobin sprays (0.1%) suppressed field inocula on mango leaves resulting in significant reduction of latent infection of anthracnose in fruits. Postharvest disease index in the fruits were declined to 1.00%. The least PLW, delayed ripening (14.78 days) and maximum shelf life (18.69 days) were obtained in fruits under this treatment signifying better quality of fruits. Such fruits at optimum ripe stage had maximum firmness, titratable acidity, TSS (20.49%), total sugars, reducing, non-reducing sugars and sugar acid ratio pointing to the unhindered and coordinated ripening process favoured by azoxystrobin.