Comparison of Methods for Inoculation of Muskmelon withFusarium oxysporumf. sp.melonis

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Abstract
Differences in Fusarium wilt resistance of three muskmelon cultivars were determined from three methods of inoculation. In the standard method, roots of uprooted seedlings were dipped in an inoculum suspension and seedlings transplanted into noninfested soil; differences among the cultivars were demonstrated when inoculated 6 and 11 days after planting. Other methods, which require considerably less labor and space, involve pipetting inoculum to undisturbed seedlings or dipping modified plastic trays containing seedlings into inoculum suspensions. The pipette inoculation method resulted in inconsistent ranking of cultivars for resistance to Fusarium wilt. The tray-dip inoculation method resulted in a consistent ranking of cultivars, but differences were not as clearly defined as those that resulted from the standard inoculation method. For all inoculation methods, less disease was observed when seedlings were inoculated 11 days after planting than 6 days after planting.