Effect of plant-based fungicide coated compound fertilizer on tomato growth, nitrogen use efficiency and disease incidence

Fungicide coated compound fertilizers were developed by using plant-based fungicidal materials. Then selected tomato species were used as experiment materials to study the effects of the fertilizers on growth, quality and nutrient use efficiency of plants. Based on the results, the coated fertilizers delayed nutrient release effectively in the ZYF1~ZYF5 (5 coated fertilizers with different plant-based fungicidal materials) treatments. Soil nitrate contents were higher even towards the later period of tomato growth under coated fertilizer treatments than that under conventional compound fertilizer treatment (CK1). Except for ZYF4, tomato yields for the coated fertilizer treatments were significantly higher than that for CK1. ZYF3 had the highest yield (11.1 kg·m^-2), which was about 16.8% higher than that of CK1. Nitrogen use efficiency under the coated fertilizer treatments was higher than that of CK1 (33.3%). Nitrogen use efficiencies of ZYF2 and ZYF3 were respectively 9.9 and 9.5 percentage points higher than that of CK1. The coated fertilizers did not significantly influence tomato Vc content. While ZYF1 significantly reduced tomato nitrate content, ZYF2, ZYF4 and ZYF5 increased tomato nitrate content. Coated fertilizer treatments significantly lowered the incidence of tomato wilt and gray mold diseases. Among the treatments, ZYF1 potentially inhibited tomato wilt and gray-mold disease incidence more significantly, with disease incidence decrease of 17.7 and 12.5 percentage points compared with CK1.