Evaluation of corm origin and climatic conditions on saffron (Crocus sativus L.) yield and quality

Abstract

BACKGROUND Crocus sativus L. is an autumn‐flowering geophyte belonging to the Iridaceae family, known for the medicinal and coloring uses of the spice from its dried stigmas. It is cultivated in countries with different pedoclimatic conditions. This paper reports on a two‐year research project carried out in the Basilicata region of southern Italy on the question of how to obtain the highest performance from saffron. It considers corms from three different geographical origins – ‘Sardinia’, ‘Abruzzo’ and ‘Kozani’ at three different cultivation sites, namely Castelgrande (40° 46′ N, 15° 26′ E, 781 m a.s.l.), Genzano di Lucania (40° 50′ N, 16° 08′ E, 344 m a.s.l.), and Villa d'Agri (40° 22′ N, 15° 48′ E, 638 m a.s.l.). RESULTS The highest yields were obtained in the second year by the combination of ‘Genzano di L. × Sardinia’ and ‘Castelgrande × Abruzzo’ with 28.1 and 23.9 kg ha−1 of dried stigma, respectively. Saffron quality was determined according to ISO 3632, which classifies the samples into three categories depending on the crocin, picrocrocin, and safranal content. Results highlighted that the highest values for coloring (242.1) and bitterness (97.7) were achieved in Genzano di L. during 2013. Moreover, the crocins were correlated positively with stigma yield and air mean temperature but negatively with safranal. CONCLUSION This study demonstrated, through principal component analysis (PCA), that the cultivation site with higher air temperature and without excessive rain during the flowering period generated the best stigma yield with high‐quality traits. © 2019 Society of Chemical Industry

The Influence of Soil Physical and Chemical Properties on Saffron (Crocus sativus L.) Growth, Yield and Quality

“…In particular, the second crop cycle was characterized by an early and shorter flowering and, by a production of flower with longer stigma and heavier stamen and tepal. In accordance with Gresta et al [22] and as reported in our previous study [44], flowering time and flower traits were positively influenced by the higher rainfall recorded during the harvesting period in 2018.…”

“…Soil properties influenced partially the flower number per corm because the corm is the primary nutrient reserve for stigma production. The contribution of corms to produce flowers depends especially on their dimension and corm geographical origins [44,45].…”

Agro-Climatic Suitability Evaluation for Saffron Production in Areas of Western Himalaya

“…This study also showed that the first three PCs with eigenvalues 3.8, 1.4, and 1.2 were most informative accounting for approximately 92.2% of the overall variance for all variables (Figure 5E). The saffron's quality is a difficult parameter because it depends on several factors, in particular environmental conditions, including altitude, temperature, precipitations that affect the anatomy and quantity viz., crocin, picrocrocin and safranal (Cardone et al, 2019). Climatic factors, viz., altitude might also influence the quality of saffron spice, especially crocin (Lage and Cantrell, 2009).…”

“…below 2 dS m −1 (Zarghani et al, 2016). It is cultivated mainly in Iran, Afghanistan, Morocco, India, Spain, Greece, and Italy (Cardone et al, 2019). Previous studies suggest that 600 mm seasonal rainfall is almost sufficient for saffron cultivation under rainfed conditions, which can vary depending on soil characteristics and fertilization practices (Fallahi and Mahmoodi, 2018a,b).…”

Evaluation Of The Effects Of Different Storage Times On Pharmacological Agents Of Saffron (Crocus sativus L.) (Safranal, Crocin and Crocetin) and Their Quality Characteristics

“…Bu metabolitler, safranın kalitesi için oldukça önemlidir. Metebolitlerin oranları bulundukları coğrafyaya göre değişmektedir ve safran kalitesi için coğrafi köken seçimi oldukça önemlidir [21,22]. Birçok araştırmacı farklı bölgelerden veya aynı bölgeden safranın uçucu bileşenlerini araştırmıştır.…”