Evaluation of Phonological, Morphological, and Pomological Characteristics of Some Nectarine Cultivars and Genotypes under Khorasan Razavi Province Climatic Conditions

علوم باغبانی

Article 7, Volume 36, Issue 1 - Serial Number 53, March 2022, Pages 87-101   

Document Type: Research Article

DOI: 10.22067/jhs.2021.68236.1012

Authors

A. Ghahremani¹; E. Ganji Moghadam^{* 2}; A. Marjani¹

¹Department of Agriculture, Faculty of Agriculture, Islamic Azad University, Bojnourd, Iran

²Crop and Horticultural Science Research Department, Khorasan Razavi Agricultural and Natural Resources Research and Education Center, AREEO, Mashhad, Iran

Abstract

Introduction
 Nectarine (Prunus persica L. Bath) belongs to Rosaceae family, Prunoidae subfamily, and Prunus genus. This fruit is generated by a vegetative mutation in one of the peach genes. Therefore, it is a kind of peach that has been developed due to the mutation of the fruit with special aroma, color, and taste. Nectarine had about 10.1% of the total distribution of stone fruits in Iran. In Khorasan Razavi province, the production and yield of nectarine were 5412.7 tons and 6243 kg/ha in 2018, respectively. Due to the lack of sufficient research on different nectarine cultivars in Khorasan Razavi province and farmers' lack of access to new and high yielding cultivars, and the use of unknown low-quality cultivars with low marketability and yield, the present study aims to investigate morphological, pomological, and qualitative responses of 10 nectarine cultivars and genotypes in Khorasan Razavi province climatic conditions were performed to select promising cultivars and genotypes.
Materials and Methods
 This study was conducted to select the best genotypes in terms of growth, morphological, and pomological traits from among ten nectarine genotypes and cultivars (‘Flamino’, ‘Nectared’, ‘Henri’, ‘Shaniaria’, ‘Royziana’, ‘Taj No.-1 and -2’, ‘Shalil No.-1’, ‘Andrros’, and ‘Sungold’ as a control) as a randomized complete block experiment with three replications during 2018-2019 in Agricultural and  Natural Resources Research and Education Center of Khorasan Razavi. The traits measured in the present study are flowering start time, flowering period, harvest time, tree height, and diameter, yield, length, width, and weight of fruit and length, width, and weight of the stone, acidity, titratable acidity, soluble solids, fruit tissue firmness, and flavor index.
Results and Discussion
 Results indicated that the cultivars and genotypes showed significant differences in terms of phenological traits (first bloom, full bloom, flowering time, flowering period, and harvest time), morphological (tree height, trunk diameter), pomological (yield, length, width, and weight of fruit and length, width, and weight of stone) and quality (acidity, titratable acidity, soluble solids, fruit tissue firmness, and flavor index). The earliest flowering genotypes were ‘Nectared’, ‘Flamino’, and ‘Sungold’, while ‘Henri’ and ‘Taj No.-1’ were the latest flowering. ‘Henri’, which had the most extended flowering period, showed a later harvest time. The panel test results showed that ‘Flamino’, ‘Henri’, and ‘Shaniaria’ had the highest rank in terms of color, texture, smell, and taste. While ‘Royziana’ had the lowest average. ‘Flamino’ had the highest chlorophyll index (36.91), which was not significantly different from the ‘Nectared’, ‘Henri’, ‘Shaniaria’, ‘Taj No. -1 and -2’. ‘Henri’ genotype with 44.6 kg yield, 3.55 kg/cm² fruit tissue firmness, and 16.39% soluble solids showed statistical superiority in quality traits. ‘Flamino’ and ‘Shahlil-1’, with 138.76 and 129.51 g, respectively, had the highest fruit weight, increasing 32.97 and 28.19% compared to the control. In the second year, due to more growth and increasing the age of the tree naturally, increased tree height (22.41%), trunk diameter (79.8%), crown of the tree (73.3%), chlorophyll index (5.16%), fruit weight (35.06%), and fruit flavor index (28.46%) were observed compared to the first year. Tree yield was positively and significantly correlated with tree height and fruit tissue firmness and negatively and significantly correlated with fruit length, fruit width, and stone length. Tree height, crown of the tree, fruit width, stone weight, and fruit weight entered the regression model, finally explaining 55.91% of the tree yield changes.
Conclusion
 In general, ‘Flamino’, ‘Nectared’, and ‘Henri’ are recommended for cultivation in Khorasan Razavi province's climatic conditions due to their high pomological and phonological traits as superior nectarine genotypes.

Keywords

Chlorophyll index; Flowering period; Fruit flavor index; Panel test

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