GUARDIAN® PEACH ROOTSTOCK PERFORMANCE AND PREPLANT SOIL FUMIGATION EFFECTS IN A FALLOW SITE

M.L. Parker, D. Ritchie, G.L. Reighard
Performance of the peach rootstock Guardian®, ‘BY520-9’ was compared to Lovell in a North Carolina site, with and without preplant fumigation. Guardian® is reported to be tolerant to both root-knot and ring nematodes, with ring nematodes contributing to the incidence of peach tree short life (PTSL). The use of Guardian® rootstock and preplant soil fumigation in PTSL prone sites are recommended practices for peach production. In this study we investigated the effect of soil fumigation and Guardian® on a site with no history of PTSL. The study site had been fallow for more than five years after a peach orchard was removed with good tree survival. Lovell was used as the industry standard and five selections that are components of commercially sold bulked Guardian® seed were used. One half of each replicate was preplant fumigated with Telone II (1,3-Dichloropropene, 281 L/treated ha) with a 3.7 m strip centered on the tree row. Four peach cultivars, developed in North Carolina, were used in this study and included ‘Challenger’, ‘Intrepid’, ‘Contender’ and ‘China Pearl’. Each cultivar was a fully replicated trial and the four trials were adjacent to one another. For all cultivars, survival in the initial seven years was greatest for the trees grown on Guardian® compared to those on Lovell. Survival for trees on Lovell ranged between 15-58% and 73-96% for trees on Guardian® across the fumigated treatment. No differences in trunk cross-sectional area (TCSA) or yield per tree were detected on the surviving trees when comparing Lovell and Guardian® trees. Due to large differences in tree survival between Guardian® and Lovell, yield/ha differences were considerable. Fumigation effects in the initial years across cultivars were less pronounced. TCSA and cumulative yield per tree, using the surviving trees, were numerically greatest for trees grown on fumigated soil compared to those grown in non-fumigated soil although the differences were not significant in the initial seven years.
Parker, M.L., Ritchie, D. and Reighard, G.L. (2011). GUARDIAN® PEACH ROOTSTOCK PERFORMANCE AND PREPLANT SOIL FUMIGATION EFFECTS IN A FALLOW SITE. Acta Hortic. 903, 469-473
DOI: 10.17660/ActaHortic.2011.903.64
https://doi.org/10.17660/ActaHortic.2011.903.64
Prunus persica, peach tree short life, survival, cumulative yield, trunk cross-sectional area, BY520-9
English

Acta Horticulturae