Articles
Rootstocks have been and will be a major component of successful, sustainable, and resilient fruit production
Article number
1457_1
Pages
1 – 12
Language
English
Abstract
A green revolution that started in the roots of dwarfed apple orchards has increased productivity, quality, and efficiency of apple production while at the same time decreasing the acreage, labor, and chemical treatments needed to grow those apples – all things that reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Dwarfing and early bearing conferred by apple rootstocks to grafted scion cultivars like ‘Honeycrisp’, ‘Gala’, ‘Golden’, and ‘Granny’ reduce the size of apple trees from 10 to 15 m tall down to a manageable size of 2-3 m and at the same time reduce juvenility years (length of nonbearing time from planting) from 5 to 7 years to 1 or 2 years.
One can imagine the enormous efficiencies to be gained if all tree fruit and nut-growing systems on Earth were able to achieve higher production on less land and much earlier after planting than the current norm.
It is estimated that dwarfing and early bearing have added $2-3 billion yearly in production efficiency in the US alone; this estimate is likely more than 10 times larger when considering world production.
Fruit growers worldwide who have used dwarfing rootstocks should congratulate themselves for their major reduction in the carbon footprint of the fruit industry.
While recent advances in apple genomics and metabolomics have shed some light on the mechanisms associated with dwarfing and early bearing in apples, the possible identification of similar processes and their application in other fruit crops needs major research effort and investment, as it will bear enormous benefits to the world community.
Dwarfing and early bearing is not the only answer to climate change, as there are other threats connected to water quality and availability, heat and cold stress, large oscillations in temperature, and the appearance of new diseases caused by changes in weather patterns, which are in part connected to the implementation of rootstock technologies.
Beyond dwarfing, the efficiency of the breeding process for a graftable fruit crop is greatly increased when trait development occurs separately for rootstocks and scions, avoiding the need to combine twice as many traits in an individual.
The application of rootstocks in tree fruit growing systems has many other effects on fruit quality, disease resistance, fertilizer use, production efficiency, and canopy management.
Our goal is to understand and find ways to leverage the genetic variability in apple rootstocks to curb such threats and promote a successful, sustainable, and resilient production of high-quality fruit.
Dwarfing and early bearing conferred by apple rootstocks to grafted scion cultivars like ‘Honeycrisp’, ‘Gala’, ‘Golden’, and ‘Granny’ reduce the size of apple trees from 10 to 15 m tall down to a manageable size of 2-3 m and at the same time reduce juvenility years (length of nonbearing time from planting) from 5 to 7 years to 1 or 2 years.
One can imagine the enormous efficiencies to be gained if all tree fruit and nut-growing systems on Earth were able to achieve higher production on less land and much earlier after planting than the current norm.
It is estimated that dwarfing and early bearing have added $2-3 billion yearly in production efficiency in the US alone; this estimate is likely more than 10 times larger when considering world production.
Fruit growers worldwide who have used dwarfing rootstocks should congratulate themselves for their major reduction in the carbon footprint of the fruit industry.
While recent advances in apple genomics and metabolomics have shed some light on the mechanisms associated with dwarfing and early bearing in apples, the possible identification of similar processes and their application in other fruit crops needs major research effort and investment, as it will bear enormous benefits to the world community.
Dwarfing and early bearing is not the only answer to climate change, as there are other threats connected to water quality and availability, heat and cold stress, large oscillations in temperature, and the appearance of new diseases caused by changes in weather patterns, which are in part connected to the implementation of rootstock technologies.
Beyond dwarfing, the efficiency of the breeding process for a graftable fruit crop is greatly increased when trait development occurs separately for rootstocks and scions, avoiding the need to combine twice as many traits in an individual.
The application of rootstocks in tree fruit growing systems has many other effects on fruit quality, disease resistance, fertilizer use, production efficiency, and canopy management.
Our goal is to understand and find ways to leverage the genetic variability in apple rootstocks to curb such threats and promote a successful, sustainable, and resilient production of high-quality fruit.
Publication
Authors
G. Fazio
Keywords
rootstock, climate resiliency, breeding efficiency, yield components, fruit quality
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