Selection of Indigenous Rhizobacterial Isolates Capable of Inducing Resistance of Chili Against Colletotrichum gloeosporioides

Anthracnose, a disease caused by Colletotrichum gloeosporioides which affects chili, is difficult to control. Biological control with indigenous rhizobacteria (RB) can be a solution as the bacteria are conditioned to their natural habitat.The advantage of using indigenous rhizobacteria is that it is easy to adapt to the target plant and multi mechanisms, i.e. not only to control plant diseases but also to enhance the growth and yield of chili. The testing of selected isolates of indigenous RB in inducing the resistance of chili against anthracnose disease. The parameters observed were: time and percentage of germination, seedling height, number of seedling leaves, root length of seedlings, wet seedling weight, dry seedling weight, incubation period, attack intensity, percentage of infected fruits, plant height, number of fruits per plant and fruit weight per plant. The resultsshowedthat19 the isolates of indigenous RB were capable of stimulating the growth of chili seedlings, which consisted of 7 isolates of indigenous RB from Padang city, 7 isolates of indigenous RB from Agam district and 5 isolates of RB from Lima Puluh Kota District. Three RB isolates were capable of controlling anthracnose disease, namely isolates of RB B1.37 and P1.31 with 0% attack intensity, and B2.11 with 27.8% anthracnose disease attack intensity.