Original scientific paper
Fruit thinning of ‘Gala’ apple trees using ethephon, NAA, BA and their combinations
Matej Stopar
; Kmetijski inštitut Slovenije, Ljubljana, Slovenija
Stanislav Tojnko
; Fakultet za kmetijstvo, Univerza v Mariboru, Maribor, Slovenija
B. Ambrožič Turk
Abstract
The thinning response was studied on six years old trees of ‘Gala’/M.9. The treatments of single application of ethephon 200 ppm at the balloon stage, of naphthaleneacetic acid (NAA) 10 ppm or benzyladenine (BA) 100 ppm at 10 mm fruit diameter as well as the sequential treatments of ethephon followed by NAA or/and BA and tank mixed NAA + BA treatment were performed. A non significant thinning was obtained in treatments when ethephon, NAA and BA were used separately. No additional thinning occurred even in the combinations when ethephon was applied first at the balloon stage and NAA or BA applied later at 10 mm fruitlet diameter. Significant thinning response occurred only when tank mixed treatment of NAA + BA and sequential treatment of ethephon followed by tank mixture of NAA + BA were carried out. In this experiment, mean fruit weight and the share of bigger sized fruits (>70mm) increased significantly in all thinning treatments compared to the non thinned control trees.
Keywords
apple thinning; fruit size; yield; ethephon; 1-naphthaleneacetic acid; 6-benzyladenine
Hrčak ID:
26634
URI
Publication date:
22.12.2007.
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