CULTIVAR DIFFERENCES IN TOLERANCE TO DAMAGE BY RAINFALL

Differences in the level of damage to fruit following six rainfall events, that ranged from 7 to 330 mm, between May and September were determined for cultivars ‘Festival’ and ‘Rubygem’ and 43 breeding lines. ‘Festival’ with an average score of 7.5 was more tolerant to rain damage than ‘Rubygem’ (6.0). Relative scores for tolerance to rain-damage were consistent across rainfall events with no cultivar×rain-event interaction. Evaluation at only one rainfall event may be sufficient to determine a cultivar’s relative resistance to rain-damage, providing key cultivars with ‘known’ levels are included as calibration points.