The lack of chilling hours, the effects of a herbicide for sugarcane and the drought are, for agronomist Raul Rolle, technician for the INTA Perico, factors that allow them to predict that peach production will be tough this year.
Addressing the current peach harvest's odds, Rolle recalled that last year some plantations were affected by the use of 2.4D that was applied to crops of sugarcane next to peach plantations that, coupled with the lack of chilling hours necessary for obtaining a good fruit production (less than 300 hours), led to, as was expected, an in general very uneven development of the spurs that carry the fruit buds. There is a fairly significant percentage of spurs with a low-load of fruit buds, many timber-producing buds and a percentage that is lower than expected of spurs with a good production of fruit buds. This problem manifests itself the most in the main peach varieties that are cultivated in the area which are the Flordasking and the large Early, and to a lesser extent in the variety that is known as Brazilian (yellow) and Tropicsnow (white), he added.
Rollé noted that in late November-December last year, "we suggested some producers to do intensive green pruning in the first fortnight of the month of January to greatly reduce the problems and to stimulate a strong sprouting and generation of spurs and fruit buds, something that almost no one did, because this period coincides with the harvesting, processing and delivery of tobacco that is a priority for the moment. Today we are seeing the consequences."
He explained that, "even when we are just going through the first half of May, 90% of the producers have already performed Winter pruning, which isn't good because the cold period hasn't started and this had led, in some cases, to the early budbreak and early flowering. Furthermore, we don't have a forecast of the weather patterns for the months of June-July. If we add to this the difficulties that we're already facing with the issue of irrigation water because of the current water emergency we can say that the future being planned for this productive activity could be quite problematic."
Thus, he felt that although there will be a harvest, "we don't believe it'll be the best, especially in quantitative yields".
Source: Ellibertario.com
