Trend of vegetative growth and fruiting of some peach cultivars budded on Okinawa and Nemaguard rootstocks

Abstract

This investigation was carried out during three successive seasons of 2014, 2015 and 2016 on three peach cultivars "Florda Prince, Early Swelling and Swelling" budded on two rootstocks Okinawa and Nemaguard to study the effect of these two rootstocks on growth, fruiting and yield. All trees were three years old, grown in sandy soil under drip irrigation system at private orchard located in, El-Bostan region, Behira Governorate, Egypt. Results showed that, Okinawa, induced bloom, vegetative bud burst, reaching its peak of bloom and maturity earlier than Nemaguard. While, Nemaguard delay the flowering duration (5 to 7 days) of all peach scions than Okinawa. Trees budded on Nemaguard scored the highest significant values of number of shoots, Avg. leaf area, tree size, TCSA, number of fruits and total yield per tree as compared with Okinawa. Scions budded on Okinawa achieved the best values of Avg. shoot length; initial and final fruit set percentages than scions budded on Nemaguard without significant differences. On the other hand, fruit development period (FDP), harvest period, yield efficiency and most of fruit quality measurements did not influenced by both rootstocks.