Increasing the number of blooms in a floral cluster

[WhippoorwillG]

What type of tips can you give for increasing the number of fruit per blooming cluster?

While I await next spring for a large grow out of f2's and beyond for a few crosses, I thought I would fish for some practical wisdom on the subject of inflorescence. I am working on some cherry lines, and would love to see higher blossom counts and/or a higher fruit-set percentage to make the lines more commercially viable. The near ideal would be the multiple long sprays like those found in Sungold, which also has a near perfect fruit-set percentage in ideal conditions.

To this point, I have had success in increasing the blooms per cluster by incorporating a multiflora selection into a couple of lines, but it still seems like a piece of the puzzle is missing??

Thoughts? Suggestions?

Thanks in advance.

[snugglekitten]

Originally Posted by WhippoorwillG

What type of tips can you give for increasing the number of fruit per blooming cluster?

While I await next spring for a large grow out of f2's and beyond for a few crosses, I thought I would fish for some practical wisdom on the subject of inflorescence. I am working on some cherry lines, and would love to see higher blossom counts and/or a higher fruit-set percentage to make the lines more commercially viable. The near ideal would be the multiple long sprays like those found in Sungold, which also has a near perfect fruit-set percentage in ideal conditions.

To this point, I have had success in increasing the blooms per cluster by incorporating a multiflora selection into a couple of lines, but it still seems like a piece of the puzzle is missing??

Thoughts? Suggestions?

Thanks in advance.

For certain, imbred lines after the initial hybrization will yield less, that being said, I believe cherries tend to be limited in the amount of blossom count per cluster they produce.

are both the parent lines high yielding to begin with?

In my personal experience, if the soil is low in nitrogen or if there is not enough sunlight I get blossom drop.

http://gardening.about.com/od/proble...lossomDrop.htm

The main cultprit is often something obvious like watering - so many people I know water their tomatoes every single day, just sprinkling, instead of flooding them once a week.

I can tell people this is wrong until I am blue in the face but lots of people won't listen to me. Oh well, I produce first, best and most in my neighborhood, so you'd think they'd get the hint!

[WhippoorwillG]

Thanks snugglekitten for the reply. I guess what I was fishing for was a discussion on the different arrangement of flowers within a floral cluster. I should have posed the question differently.

I do agree that environmentally, there are quite a few things that can cause blossom drop, but some multi-flora varieties in particular are not really expected to have anywhere near "perfect" fruit set.

The results I have had in my relatively limited experience have created some favorable plants that easily increase fruit numbers by a lot and have shown no tendency to drop blossoms under normal conditions. However, the clusters look like bunches of grapes as opposed to the long alternating trusses like those seen on Sungold. These clusters can pose some challenges in our hot humid environment, especially late in the season when the pests start to become a bigger challenge to keep in check.

Thanks again.

[bower]

Mark,

It is an interesting question, how to balance increases in flower/fruit set with disease pressure. In my environment botrytis mold is always waiting in the wings to wreak some damage. Dropped blossoms are prone to be the first site of mold infection. So plants that drop a lot of blossoms are bad news for me: the drops that fall onto leaves or stems can start something fatal.

Traits I've been looking at, besides cluster architecture and size, are resistance to mold in the blossoms, full setting, and petals that drop away easily and clean from set fruit.

There is for sure a genetic component, to whether a plant will tend to drop or not drop some blossoms, over and above general stress resistance traits which also affect full set or not in adverse conditions. Plants that resist blossom drop in excess heat conditions are rare - retaining and setting in cold conditions is more common. But some plants - especially those that set a lot of fruit - may commonly drop some of their blossoms whether stressed or not, evidently part of the fruit weight management strategy in those plants. Some other varieties use a different strategy, setting all but not growing all of their fruit at once. The same balancing act is in play when larger clusters set produce smaller fruit. There is no advantage to the plant that sets more fruit load than it can support, with clusters at risk to break and fall under the weight before the fruit mature. Unpruned plants also use their own strategies to provide fruit support, by sendng up a strong sucker just below each fruit cluster, which it can rest against. Researchers (eg Merle) have found that fruit load can be increased by providing strong fruit support early. The plant that feels the fruit supported will grow larger/more fruit in that cluster. All of these observations support the view that tomato plants use one strategy or another to ensure that their fruit set is sufficiently supported, and will either drop, not grow, or reduce the size of set to compensate for insufficient support..

I have avoided the multiflora types because I heard they dropped a lot of blossoms, which would cause mold problems here. There are some full setting plants that sometimes produce forked or doubled clusters eg Kimberley, Stupice, Moravsky Div, but the clusters afaik are not as long as Sungold or Gardener's Delight.

I am curious about the incidence of pests on the 'bunch of grapes' type cluster architecture. Can you tell me more? Thanks.

[WhippoorwillG]

Bower, that is some great info, and it gave me some other ways to approach the challenge.

The primary pest problem late in year is squash / stink bugs. The clusters seem to provide a shelter for the babies, so something like pyganic doesn't provide the kill rate (it seems) as it does on more open plants....much like squash plants. No shelter = fewer pests. Those boogers ruin every fruit in the field if left unchecked. And let them pierce a fruit near the middle of the cluster, and watch what happens to the surrounding fruit... That specifically, paired with the humidity and heat is a recipe for disaster. I also cringe at the thought of killing all of the spiders and other beneficials when I am forced to spray more often.

Most often, I use a Florida weave, or lazy Florida weave (clips) if I get behind, and trim to one or two stems depending upon the plant and spacing. This keeps mold from foliage and blossom drop to a minimum for me, but does invite sun scald if im not careful, so no approach solves everything.

Thanks again to you both. It does give me more to consider.