Abstract. Relationships among climate changes, early frost, and fruit growth were studied during the final month to harvest of late-maturing 'Fuyu' persimmon (Diospyros kaki) to assess the changes in fruit characteristics during this critical period. The heavy frost on Nov. 16 defoliated more than 70% of the leaves, but with little damage on the fruits. However, all the leaves were defoliated by the heavy frost on Nov. 20, and all the fruits were cold-damaged by -3.3℃ on Nov. 21. Fruit weight increased by 8-25 g per week from Oct. 25 (142 days after full bloom) to Nov. 15, reaching to 250 g, but it decreased by 3-4 g per week after the frost. Hunter a value of fruit skin gradually increased until the last harvest on Nov. 29 with a temporary halt in early Nov. when temperature was high, whereas fruit firmness rapidly decreased after the frost on Nov. 21. Fruit soluble solids were 15.7-16

This study investigated the relationships between fruit size and other fruit quality components in "Fuyu" persimmon. The flower buds were thinned to leave one or two buds per bearing shoot in mid-May. All fruits were harvested on November 12 and they were divided into six size classes by fresh weight. The length/diameter (L/D) ratio and flesh firmness significantly decreased as fruit size increased. Large fruits had a redder skin color with more seeds than small ones. There was a strong negative relationship between fruit size and the L/D ratio (R 2 = 0.741, p ≤ 0.01) and firmness (R 2 = 0.604, p ≤ 0.01). Skin color and number of seeds per fruit were positively related to fruit size, especially skin color where the relationship was highly positive (R 2 = 0.771, p ≤ 0.01). There was a weak, but non-significant positive relation between fruit size and soluble solids. P, K, and Ca concentrations significantly decreased with increasing fruit size. Highly negative relationships were found between fruit size and fruit P (R 2 = 0.393, p ≤ 0.01), K (R 2 = 0.446, p ≤ 0.01), and Ca (R 2 = 0.417, p ≤ 0.01) concentrations. Fruit N and Mg concentrations were not affected by fruit size. It was concluded that fruit size is related to shape, coloration, flesh firmness, and number of seeds per fruit, affecting concentrations of some mineral nutrients in fruits.

No abstract

No abstract

This is an Open-Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. ABSTRACT Persimmon (Diospyros kaki Thunb.) is classified into four types based on the fruit traits, astringency and flesh color. Of the four types, the pollination-constant non-astringent (PCNA) fruit is typically most desirable for consumption. In the present study, we used five sequence characterized amplified region (SCAR) markers associated with astringency in persimmon fruit, namely E4/E9r, E4/A2r, 7H9F/AST-R, AST-F/AST-R, and AST-F/PCNA-F/5R3R, to improve the efficiency of PCNA-type persimmon breeding via marker-assisted selection (MAS). A total of 84 cultivars of the four types and their segregating F1 progeny were used to evaluate the association of SCAR markers with the fruit astringency phenotype. Polymerase chain reaction evaluation of each SCAR marker showed that E4/E9r combined with AST-F/PCNA-F/5R3R was appropriate for selecting the ast allele responsible for PCNA-type fruit, as the phenotype-genotype match percentages of these two markers were 94% and 99%, respectively. This MAS was verified by the successful use of AST-F/PCNA-F/5R3R to select 107 PCNA-type individuals from 609 F1 hybrid progeny derived from various crosses.