In the present study, different wheat varieties were evaluated for stripe rust resistance against local pathotypes under natural environmental conditions of district Layyah. The relationship of meteorological variables viz. maximum and minimum temperature, rainfall, relative humidity and wind speed with leaf rust severity on different genotypes were determined through Pearson correlation and simple linear regression analysis. Results demonstrated that only one genotype Punjab-11 was resistant with 85.75 AUDPC value. The three varieties Millat-11, V-2 and V-5 indicated moderately resistant whereas, Galaxy-13 showed moderately resistant to moderately susceptible response against disease development with high to moderate AUDPC values. All meteorological variables showed a significant relationship with stripe rust severity. Maximum disease severity was recorded at maximum and minimum temperatures ranging from 20-26 and 12.5-16.5 ℃, respectively. The relative humidity, rainfall and wind speed proved most conductive for stripe rust development in the range of 55-70 %, 5-15 mm, 4.5-10.9 Km/h, respectively. It was concluded that all meteorological variables were significantly contributed to the stripe rust disease development in the district Layyah.
