MULTI-YEAR STUDY OF COMMERCIAL POMEGRANATES IN CALIFORNIA EXHIBITS SIGNIFICANT YIELD VARIABILITY

To optimize data collection for future field experiments, 240 vegetatively propagated trees, ‘Wonderful’, age 15-18 years, were monitored for fruit yield during 2009-2012. Trees were in a block of 6 rows (5.2 m) × 40 trees (4.3 m) within a commercial orchard.
Traditional farming practices were applied to the single trunk-multi scaffold trees, with no experimental treatments.
Trees were allowed to crop naturally as fruit thinning is not common in California.
Strip harvest occurred in late September or early October after reaching early maturity but prior to fruit cracking.
Average annual yield per tree ranged from 70.0 to 96.6 kg, with coefficient of variation of 0.135 to 0.225 indicating high variation both between trees and between years.
Correlation between total yield and total fruit count was 0.893 (within-year range 0.820-0.922). Average fruit weight was negatively correlated to both total yield (-0.149) and total fruit count (-0.559). Trunk circumference and trunk cross sectional area were not reliably correlated to any yield component.
Experiments should have sufficient trees per plot to minimize the mean coefficient of variation, thus allowing for detection of treatment differences.

III International Symposium on Pomegranate and Minor Mediterranean Fruits

E.D. Wilkins, D.L. McCoy

Punica granatum, statistical significance, experimental design, optimum

https://doi.org/10.17660/ActaHortic.2015.1089.52