US research looks to lessen impact of future freezes on peach crops
Capitalizing on the shortage, growers in Illinois, whose crops fared better through the freeze are seeing growing demand for their peaches. Demand for peaches is approximately 50 percent higher than normal, with prices expected to increase says Michelle Sirles, vice president of Rendleman Orchards said.
Fortunately for the less fortunate states, research is well under way to help find ways to solve the recurring problem. In the long term, Clemson University horticulturalist Greg Reighard is optimistic that breeders will be able to combine lower chill varieties with later bloom timing to maximize resilience.
Breeding for later bloom?
Peach growers have relied on chill hour requirements for decades to make planting decisions, but breeders are just now starting to pay attention to the less understood warm hour requirement that dictates how much warm spring weather is needed to convince a tree that it’s safe to bloom.
A short warm requirement means earlier blooming, and it’s typically found in cultivars bred for warm climates, where chill hours are harder to come by and spring frosts are not much of a risk.
Ideally, breeders would like to combine a cultivar with a moderate chill requirement — something suited to a winter like this past one — with a longer warm requirement that delays bloom until more frost risk has passed. The Clemson breeding program is taking on this task, breeder Ksenija Gasic said.
Work is well underway for the genes controlling chill requirements, and Clemson scientists are seeking a USDA grant to fund research on the warm requirements so they can ultimately breed for delayed bud break and increased frost protection.
“I want a marker to tell me the heat requirement, so we can breed a tree that requires 600 to 700 chill hours and has a high heat requirement or high base temperatures to start counting, which would push it to bloom late,” Gasic said.
Source: goodfruit.com, altondailynews.com
