Phelipanche aegyptiaca management in tomato

Summary Phelipanche and Orobanche species (broomrapes) areroot holoparasitic plants that cause severe damage toeconomically important crops. Phelipanche and Oroban-che spp. are widespread in Mediterranean areas, in Asiaand in Southern and Eastern Europe, attacking dicot-yledonous crops and depending entirely on their hostsfor all nutritional requirements. Phelipanche aegyptiaca,Phelipanche ramosa and Orobanche cernua are extremelytroublesome weeds on tomatoes. These noxious para-sites exert their greatest damage prior to their shootemergence and flowering; therefore, the majority of fieldloss may occur before diagnosis of infection. This reviewsummarises the four main control measures for theweedy root parasites Phelipanche and Orobanche intomato, namely chemical and biological control, resis-tant varieties and sanitation. Some of these methods arecommercially widely used by farmers in Israel (chemicalcontrol), some are in the final stages of developmenttowards commercialisation (resistant varieties and san-itation), and some still require further development andimprovement before commercial implementation (bio-logical control). The review presents an up-to-datesummary of the available knowledge on their use forbroomrape management in processing tomatoes.Keywords: Phelipanche, Orobanche, management, chem-ical control, biological control, sanitation, breeding,resistant varieties, Solanum lycopersicum.H