Factors affecting alternaria appearance in grains in European Russia

Infection of cereal seeds induced by fungi of the genus Alternaria is very common. There are different opinions about the damage of Alternaria spp. probably because of the fact that these fungi are not a homogenous group. It is rational and available at this moment to identify Alternaria fungi isolated from the grain samples up to the section level only. Members of two sections, Alternaria and Infectoriae, are the most widespread. Our work was aimed to reveal impact of a number of factors on Alternaria infection rate in cereal grain using relatively extensive data. We studied significance of the crop, its cultivar, predecessor, region, district, season, infestation by other Alternaria species and by fungal species of some another genera. During this research, 422 grain samples of wheat, barley, sorghum and maize collected in 2010-2012 in seven regions of European part of Russia were analyzed. The majority of samples represented wheat grain from Stavropolskii Kray and Krasnodarskii Kray (southern Russia regions)...