<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">

Growing citrus involves cultural treatments such as girdling and foliar potassium treatment to increase fruit size, yield and quality. The aim of the study was to evaluate the effects of single and double stem girdling, potassium nitrate (KNO3) treatment on leaves and combinations of these treatments on the fruit yield, size and quality characteristics, leaf chlorophyll concentration and leaf nitrogen content, leaf fluorescence (PSII) and leaf sugar content of the ‘Fremont’ mandarin variety. Girdling treatments were applied on the stem by removing 4 mm wide ring of bark at the end of anthesis and after the June fruit drop. Foliar KNO3 applications were applied at a concentration of 4% twice (90 days and 120 days after full anthesis) in the experiment. The single girdling (SG) and double girdling (DG) treatments on stems increased fruit yield (kg · tree−1) by approximately 40% relative to the control (C). Treatments did not significantly affect the internal fruit quality of the ‘Fremont’ mandarin variety except in fruit colour and appearance. The highest impact on fruit size was found in the DG + KNO3 treatment. According to treatments and periods, the SPAD values varied between 62.08 and 70.67, whereas the PSII values varied between 0.698 and 0.756. The treatments significantly increased the leaf nitrogen (N) concentration and the fructose, glucose and sucrose concentrations relative to the control. The highest N concentration content was detected in the foliar potassium treatment, and the highest total sugar content was detected in the SG treatment.
</abstract>

Growing citrus involves cultural treatments such as girdling and foliar potassium treatment to increase fruit size, yield and quality. The aim of the study was to evaluate the effects of single and double stem girdling, potassium nitrate (KNO3) treatment on leaves and combinations of these treatments on the fruit yield, size and quality characteristics, leaf chlorophyll concentration and leaf nitrogen content, leaf fluorescence (PSII) and leaf sugar content of the ‘Fremont’ mandarin variety. Girdling treatments were applied on the stem by removing 4 mm wide ring of bark at the end of anthesis and after the June fruit drop. Foliar KNO3 applications were applied at a concentration of 4% twice (90 days and 120 days after full anthesis) in the experiment. The single girdling (SG) and double girdling (DG) treatments on stems increased fruit yield (kg · tree−1) by approximately 40% relative to the control (C). Treatments did not significantly affect the internal fruit quality of the ‘Fremont’ mandarin variety except in fruit colour and appearance. The highest impact on fruit size was found in the DG + KNO3 treatment. According to treatments and periods, the SPAD values varied between 62.08 and 70.67, whereas the PSII values varied between 0.698 and 0.756. The treatments significantly increased the leaf nitrogen (N) concentration and the fructose, glucose and sucrose concentrations relative to the control. The highest N concentration content was detected in the foliar potassium treatment, and the highest total sugar content was detected in the SG treatment.

Influences of girdling and potassium treatments on fruit quality and some physiological characters of ‘Fremont’ mandarin variety

Department of Horticulture, Faculty of Agriculture

Folia Horticulturae

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Growing citrus involves cultural treatments such as girdling and foliar potassium treatment to increase fruit size, yield and quality. The aim of the study was...

Influences of girdling and potassium treatments on fruit quality and some physiological characters of ‘Fremont’ mandarin variety

Article Category: Original Article

Published Online: Jun 05, 2021

Page range: 195 - 202

Received: Mar 11, 2021

Accepted: Apr 23, 2021

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/fhort-2021-0015

Keywords
chlorophyll, citrus, girdling, quality, sugar content

© 2021 Tuğba Ülker et al., published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Influences of girdling and potassium treatments on fruit quality and some physiological characters of ‘Fremont’ mandarin variety

Article Category: Original Article

Published Online: Jun 05, 2021

Page range: 195 - 202

Received: Mar 11, 2021

Accepted: Apr 23, 2021

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/fhort-2021-0015

Keywordschlorophyll, citrus, girdling, quality, sugar content

© 2021 Tuğba Ülker et al., published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Keywords
chlorophyll, citrus, girdling, quality, sugar content