ISHS Acta Horticulturae 773: XXVII International Horticultural Congress - IHC2006: International Symposium on Citrus and Other Tropical and Subtropical Fruit Crops
EFFECT OF TEMPERATURE ON CALAMONDIN (CITRUS MICROCARPA) FLOWERING AND FLOWER BUD FORMATION |
| Authors: | Yi-Ting Lai, Iou-Zen Chen |
| Keywords: | calamondin |
| Abstract:
Three-year-old grafted calamondin (Citrus microcarpa; syn. C. mandurensis) plants were used for a three-step experiment. In the first step, the plants were heavily pruned and put in the field for two months to promote bud sprouting, then treated with four day/night temperature sequences 30/25, 25/20, 20/15 or 15/13°C. The first flushes of calamondin after heavy pruning were all vegetative flushes and flower buds occurred in second flushes. The plants held at 30/25°C began to bloom after 2 weeks and full bloom occurred after 8 weeks. This treatment had the greater flower number. The plants in 25/20°C began to bloom after 8 weeks while those in 20/15 and 15/13°C bloomed after 22 weeks. In the second step, the plants bud were anatomically observed for flower differentiation after heavy pruning and force shooting in 27.5/ 22.5°C for 3 weeks, although the plants treated with 15/13°C failed to bloom in experiment period. In the third step, the plants treated with 20/15 and 15/13°C failed to bloom during 14 weeks, but flower buds were observed 2 weeks later after moving the plants from 20/15 and 15/13 to 30/25°C. The results showed that flower bud formation of calamondin was not influenced whether plants were held in high or low temperature conditions. It means that temperature possibly is not an important factor to influence flower bud formation of calamondin, but low temperature treatment may suppress the process of flower differentiation. | |
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