Abstract

Streptomycetes play a key role in the sustainability of agriculture and indicates the level of health of soil, especially when considering the richness of them that are involved in biological control of soil borne diseases. 20 different soil samples were taken from agricultural (7) and non-agricultural places (13) and populations of streptomycetes were quantified in order to select the general culture media that had better reflect the changes of these bacteria. The most efficient medium for the isolation of Streptomyces was starch casein agar by the addition of nystatin. Pretreatment of soil samples with CaCO₃ (1%) increased the streptomycetes occurring on the isolation plates. To establish a correlation with soil physico-chemical parameters, such as pH, salt, N, P, K, Na, Fe, Zn and Cu were also determined, most of the correlations being significantly positive on the quantification of Streptomyces diversity. Streptomycete counts ranged from a high of 6.7 x 10⁶ to a low of 2.3 x 10⁶ cfu/g dry soil of non-agricultural soils. Streptomycetes constituted 4.8 to 45.8% of the total culturable bacterial community. Higher streptomycete densities were greatest in non-agricultural soils with an average of 14.0% compared to agricultural soils with average of 10.1%. These results suggest that these bacteria may be represent an unexplored resource for pharmaceutical drug discovery but also may provide additional disease control in agriculture.

Key words: Agricultural soil, non-agricultural soils, culturable bacteria, isolation, pretreatment, Streptomyces diversity.