Thinning Apple Flower Blossoms
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Category |
Agriculture |
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Keywords |
Flower Blossom Thinning |
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Current development stage |
General list: TRL6 Technology demonstrated in relevant environment |
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Collaboration Opportunity |
Licensing of Technology |
Background
Apple Blossoms have 5-6 flowers per blossom, and in most varieties, the fruitlets must be thinned out to ~ 1 fruitlet/blossom. If not, the apples will be small, and the neighboring bourse shoot will not flower the following year. Apple fruitlets are thinned out either manually or via chemical sprays.
Our Innovation
Prof. Samach discovered that two chemicals, which are currently available on the market, are extremely efficient when mixed together. Even at low concentrations, the chemicals have an effect in thinning apple blossoms in a variety that currently does not have a reliable chemical solution, Red Delicious (Starking/ Top Red).
Technology
In the below graphs you can see that the double treatment had a significant effect causing more fruitlet abscission and increasing the number of inflorescences with 0-1 remaining fruit. The single treatments had no significant effect. The double treatment had no negative side effects. Although 0 fruit does not seem desirable for the inexperienced eye, it is actually very important in TopRed since these are the only spurs that will contain flowers for the next year (Haberman et al., 2016).
Opportunity
A provisional patent has been field for this technology and results are unpublished. Yissum and the researcher are looking for industrial partners to take a license to this technology.
