STUDY OF FLOWERING AND FRUITING CHARACTERISTICS OF TWO STRAINS OF EARLY SEASON LONGAN (DIMOCARPUS LONGAN LOUR.)

Two early season strains of longan (Dimocarpus longan Lour.), ‘Early Season 1’ and ‘Early Season 2’, were compared with ‘Shixia’ (Dimocarpus longan Lour. cv. Shixia), an early season cultivar of longan widely grown in Guangxi province of China for their flowering and fruiting characteristics. The results showed that ‘Early Season 1’ and ‘Early Season 2’ started to bloom on 8^th of April, 2 d earlier than ‘Shixia’. Fruits of ‘Early Season 1’ and ‘Early Season 2’ matured on 20^th and 25^th of July, 14 d and 10 d earlier than that of ‘Shixia’, respectively. Single fruit weight of ‘Early Season 1’, ‘Early Season 2’ and ‘Shixia’ were 11.05, 10.8 and 9.8 g, respectively. The content of TSS of ‘Early Season 1’ and ‘Early Season 2’ were 19.3 and 19.2%, being 2.7 and 2.8% lower than that of ‘Shixia’, respectively. Both strains show good potential as high quality early season varieties.