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ARS Home » Northeast Area » Kearneysville, West Virginia » Appalachian Fruit Research Laboratory » Innovative Fruit Production, Improvement, and Protection » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #398123
Research Project: Integrated Production and Automation Systems for Temperate Fruit Crops

Location: Innovative Fruit Production, Improvement, and Protection

Title: Manipulating female flower intensity in 'yu her pau' litchi by delayed winter pruning

Author
item CHANG, JENYU - Taiwan Agricultural Research Institute
item Tang, Lisa

Submitted to: International Journal of Horticultural Science
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 2/28/2023
Publication Date: N/A
Citation: N/A

Interpretive Summary: Since leaves play an important role in floral induction in response to winter low temperatures, we investigated whether delaying the pruning time, which preserves leaves on trees for an extended period, would enhance flowering in litchi trees. We found that delaying December pruning for one month to January led to an almost two-fold increase in flowers in March. This suggests that for litchi grown in areas experiencing warmer winters due to climate change, postponing winter pruning could lessen the negative impacts of insufficient low temperatures on spring flower formation.

Technical Abstract: ‘Yu Her Pau’ litchi (Litchi chinensis) has excellent fruit quality. However, its production on Taiwan is limited by low productivity despite being regarded as a high-quality fruit. It is known that litchi’s leaves play a critical role in floral induction under low temperature. Thus, we hypothesized that the flower intensity in spring could be manipulated by altering the leaf quality in winter; thereby, increasing crop load. In this pilot study, ‘Yu Her Pau’ trees were pruned in mid-December [early pruning (EP)], one of the common cultural practices carried out by growers in the region, as control or mid-January [late pruning (LP)]. This resulted in 50% and 100% canopy foliage for EP and LP trees, respectively, between mid-December and mid-January. At the peak blooming time in March, LP trees produced significantly more female flowers than EP trees (95.8 and 56.1/panicle, respectively) with no negative effects on initial fruit set number, fruitlet abscission, or fruit quality at harvest. Our results suggest additional mature leaves present on trees in mid-December onward may benefit litchi flower formation without affecting fruit retention. Thus, preserving leaves with delayed pruning might potentially mitigate the negative impacts of warmer winters due to climate change on litchi flowering.