Looking at the different “things” that go into getting a sizeable fruit set. I have a rainier cherry that we just harvested that had cherries that were sized like you’d see in the store (but tons better for flavor) and my Tasty Rich that i took a few ripe fruit from that weren’t much bigger (2" long, about 1" wide) that may have been over ripe. The flavor was perfect in my eyes and my 4 year old thought so too.
Now my question is this. The cherry is in ground and the Tasty Rich is potted. The potted stock gets less water than the cherry in ground. Some of my peaches are going to be coming in pretty soon. I haven’t seen a noticeable change in some of them, while others are getting larger and in some cases leap frogging (PF5B compared to PF35). The 5Bs aren’t much larger than the Tasty Rich was in terms of size. Are they ripe, no. But i am worried about the apparent lack of sizing.
So I’m really just asking what goes into fruit size? I fully understand size means NOTHING when it comes to flavor, but to have a whole harvest of peaches the size of the Apriums i picked would be a HUGE let down.
If I could find the article I’d read, I would link you to it, but I’ve lost track of it. It said that one of things that affects size is very early thinning while cell numbers are still rapidly multiplying, and that later thinning has less of an effect on final size. Ditto for available water and nutrients while the fruit is still very small affecting the final possible size.
In the later stages of ripening, cell division slows considerably. Water availability in the late stages affects cell size, thus water content, rather than number of cells.
Fruit from potted trees is smaller than in ground. In my experience usually considerably smaller than the same fruit in ground. A 2x1 inch Tasty Rich sounds pretty good sized to me. That’s certainly way bigger than any cherry I’ve grown.
I think potted fruit is small for two reasons. The small root volume must play some part. But I’ve found it hard to thin those trees as much as needed for large fruit.
No last year. it has 3 times as many this year, but PC hit it really hard. I doubt I will have as many as last year. I looked at my journal and I harvested 2015 09 07, with a note that is could have probably used another week.
Yes Tasty Rich aprium. Maybe we differ on what 2x1 inch looks like. No cherry is 2 inches, not that I’ve seen and I’ve grown 17 gram cherries, My Tasty Rich were about 2x1 this yr. That’s much smaller than normal but the taste was the best ever. I’ll take the great taste over size.
Drew,
Wow nectaplum-zilla! That slug thought he found a fruit gold mine! What kind of blackberries?
Bleeding dirt,
Those look wonderful!
Fruitnut,
Think I need to try some apriums!
Genetics of the cultivar - the dominant determinant
Potash - in your climate (5B) the available amount after harvest through Fall. Note though that an overabundance of potash is phytotoxic. A general guide for many fruiting plants is 1.5 times the amount of annual Nitrogen.
Those are BEAUTIFUL! What is the story with the aluminum foil in the background? Is it to block light off something for some reason? Sort of looks like maybe its covering a plant for some reason?
Wait wait wait wait. PLEASE tell me you are just joking about butter fried slugs??? I know the French and others eat snails and I’ve even tried them, but that is a 100 miles from a slug in my mind!!! You were kidding, right?
j/k
!!??