ARCHITECTURAL DIVERSITY OF APRICOT TREES: WHICH MORPHOLOGICAL CHARACTERS CAN BE USED TO CLASSIFY CULTIVARS?

A set of cultivars with diverse branching and fruiting habits were grown with a minimal training, at INRA Montpellier (France) experimental station, in order to study their architectural development and to characterise the architectural diversity observed within Prunus armeniaca L. species.
This qualitative study first confirmed that the architectural rules previously defined from observations of apricot trees developed from seeds, were available for grafted trees and for all the cultivars, even in different climatic conditions.
Then, it led us to propose a classification of apricot tree cultivars, using two main criteria. The first chosen criterium was the occurrence of trunk bending.
Four classes were considered from cultivars which bent very rapidly (e.g. ‘Bergeron’ or ‘Palsteyn’) to those which remain erected whatever their development stage (e.g. ‘Stark Early Orange’). We chose as second criterium the shoot morphology, from thick (e.g. ‘Palsteyn’) to slender (e.g. ‘Bergeron’). The proposed classification, based on the organisation of the tree main stems, has relationships with the spurs location and life span on the one hand and the fruiting behaviour on the other hand.
These criteria were included in the classification and finally five groups of distinct fruiting behaviours were identified.
The availability of the chosen criteria and their link with underlying biological processes are discussed.

XII International Symposium on Apricot Culture and Decline

E. Costes, D. Fournier, J.M. Audergon, J.M. Legave, G. Clauzel

habit, plant morphology, fruiting behaviour, selection

https://doi.org/10.17660/ActaHortic.2006.701.13