A REVIEW ON THE BIOLOGY OF SOIL NEMATODES AND THEIR ECONOMIC SIGNIFICANCE IN AGRICULTURE

Nematodes are roundworms similar to the animal parasites encountered in livestock and pets.
Soil dwelling nematodes are both good guys and bad guys in crop production. The good
nematodes, which don’t get much press, feed on fungi, bacteria, and other creatures that live in
the soil and thereby recycle the nutrients contained in it. Tens of millions of mostly beneficial
nematodes live in each square meter of cropland; however, a few of these microscopic
roundworms the plant-pathogenic nematodes give all nematodes a bad name. Most of the plant
pathogenic nematodes (referred to simply as nematodes from here) feed on plant roots, although
some less common ones feed in various aboveground plant parts. The root-feeding nematodes
are either ectoparasites, which feed from outside the root or endoparasites, which feed from
inside the root. All plant-feeding nematodes feed by means of a stylet, a structure in the head of
a nematode that allows it to pierce plant cell walls. The objectives of this work is to briefly
describe the biology of nematode species including basic characteristics, the diversity
classification, agricultural and ecological importance. Relevant information's from related
published articles, books and other biological materials were used as my sources. Conclusively
it can be said that, the science of nematology is relatively young compared to entomology and
plant pathology and free living nematode species are abundant, including nematodes that feed
on bacteria, fungi, and other nematodes, yet majority of species encountered are poorly
understood.