Effects of supplementary pollination on cropping success and fruit quality in pistachio

Abstract

The effects of pollen supplementation in pistachio orchards using an electrostatic pollination device were investigated in a 3‐year study (1996‐98) in San Joaquin Valley, California, USA. Both yield and fruit quality (per cent split fruit) were tested in several experiments. Applying smaller amounts of pollen (1.5 g per tree in early application only in 1996 or 0.5 g in two applications in 1997) resulted in higher yields than with open pollination or supplementary pollination using larger amounts of pollen (1.5 g per tree in four applications in 1996 or 1.0 g in two applications in 1997). Applying 1.0 g pollen in two applications in 1998 resulted in decreased yields compared with open pollination or non‐electrostatic pollination. Pollen germinability on the stigma was greatest for open pollination suggesting that overloading the stigmas with pollen in supplementary pollination may not only reduce yield but also increase competition between pollen grains. The per cent split fruit significantly increased only once in 1996. When pollination is a limiting factor, electrostatic pollination of pistachio can increase yield and may even increase fruit quality. However, when pollination is not a limiting factor, electrostatic pollination may even reduce yield.

The role of large environmental noise in masting: General model and example from pistachio trees

“…This is not generally believed to occur in pistachio. However, it has been shown that pollen limitation may occur in some years, but not in others, in pistachio (Vaknin et al, 2002). This suggests that pollination efficiency (seeds produced per amount of available pollen) may not be Average power spectrum of individual-level signal.…”

Management of Pollination Services to Enhance Crop Productivity

“…Pistachio is dioecious; both hand pollination and spray pollination have been tried (Caglar and Kaska 1994 ;Kuru 1994 ;Vaknin et al 2002 ;Zeraatkar et al 2013 ). Hand pollination used to be a common practice for oil palm plantations in Malaysia before the introduction of its natural pollinator, weevil from Africa (Hartley 1988 ).…”

The Significance of Pollination Services for Biodiesel Feedstocks, with Special Reference to Jatropha curcas L.: A Review

“…Today it seems that pollination systems in many areas of agriculture are threatened by inadequacy of pollinators, or lack of sustainably managed pollinators-indigenous or imported [11]. Therefore, management of pollinating agents is used on some crop species, whereas others require supplementary pollination [14][15][16].…”