USE OF HORMONE SETTING SPRAYS WITH MONOCULTURE ORCHARDS TO GIVE MORE REGULAR CROPPING

In conventional English orchards of Cox’s Orange Pippin apple, cross-pollination is promoted by incorporating pollinator trees and introducing hive bees at flowering.
However, this orchard system has not resulted in regularity of cropping.
This paper reports on an alternative system of cropping in which the setting of a monoculture Cox orchard was stimulated by use of a hormone mixture.
The results of a three year experiment at Wye College on a newly established orchard showed that a single, annual application of a mixture containing gibberellin, cytokinin and auxin consistently increased the yield of self-pollinated trees to a level assessed as satisfactory for the size of tree.
In the first year of cropping, hormone treatment increased fruit numbers ten-fold and in the following years, the crop on the treated trees was approximately double that in the previous year.
No significant residual effects of the treatment were found on subsequent years’ cropping.
The potential advantages of this new orchard system are discussed.

V International Symposium on Growth Regulators in Fruit Production

G.K. Goldwin

https://doi.org/10.17660/ActaHortic.1986.179.49