African and Mediterranean Agricultural Journal - Al Awamia (Mar 2022)

Effects of Citrus Rootstocks on Fruit Yield and Quality of ‘Nadorcott’ Mandarin

  • E.B. Nadori,
  • M. El Guilli,
  • A. Hamza,
  • A. Samdi,
  • Z. Baiz.,
  • E. Kharbouch

DOI
https://doi.org/10.34874/IMIST.PRSM/afrimed-i129.31416
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 0, no. 129
pp. 211 – 225

Abstract

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The effects of citrus rootstocks on the performance and fruits characteristics of commercial varieties are known and well documented. These effects, as well as the resistance to biotic and abiotic stresses, constitute the main criteria that direct the rootstock choice for a new citrus orchard. The Moroccan variety ‘Nadorcott’ mandarin also called ‘W. Murcott’ and ‘Afourer’ is relatively new. ‘Nadorcott’ is a popular late mandarin cultivar, owing to its good eating quality and excellent bearing capacity. Thus, there are few undertaken research and available results related to its behavior on the widely used rootstocks in the main citrus growing areas of Morocco Kingdom. This paper presents the results of a field trial carried out in the North West Morocco, a coastal area, to evaluate the effects of five rootstocks on ‘Nadorcott’ yield and fruit quality: juice content, total soluble solids (TSS), acid content (A), maturity index expressed as TSS/A ratio and Citrus Color Index (CCI). The results show that the highest yields were observed on citrange C-35 and Citrus macrophylla (MAC) over the three seasons. Additionally, percentage of juice content over two successive years of fruits produced on C-35, Troyer citrange (CT), Carrizo citrange (CC) and Swingle citrumelo (SW) was about 53 % but did not exceed 50 % for Citrus macrophylla. The highest TSS was obtained on CC rootstock. However, the TSS was less than 10 in 2013 and around 11 °Brix in 2014 for Citrus macrophylla and above 12 °Brix for the other rootstocks. Regarding the maturity index, apart from the low value (11.3) scored by MAC, in 2013 due to a low TSS, there was no significant difference between the maturity indices of the fruits of the mandarin 'Nadorcott' produced on the different rootstocks tested. Furthermore, the five rootstocks had no effect on the fruit color parameters of 'Nadorcott' mandarin.

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