Response of healthy local tomato (Solanum lycopersicum L.) populations to grafting in organic farming

Abstract

Demands for tomato local varieties are increasing worldwide, especially in organic farming mainly for their high sensory value and attractive appearance. This is the case of the “Moruno” tomato type, widely grown in the Mediterranean countries and greatly due to its highly appreciated organoleptic attributes but low yield or a short postharvest period. For this reason, the study aimed to assess if grafting of local “Moruno” populations (Mor-62, Mor-204) using commercial rootstocks (King-Kong F1, K; Multifort F1, M; Spirit F1, S) affects yield, fruit nutritional and functional composition, postharvest storage and consumer acceptance. Results showed differences between both populations, while rootstocks were only different for the glucose content and the flavour quality. Grafting improved the marketable yield (~43%), fruit number (~22%) and mean fruit weight (~12%), but had no incidence on the blossom-end rot disorder. This technique increased the carotenoid (lycopene, β-carotene and total carotene) content but decreased the organic acids (malic and citric) and sugar (fructose and glucose) rates, while ascorbic acid was not affected. The fruit postharvest storage was not practically modified. However, the overall flavour preference and visual appearance varied depending on the scion.

Effect of Grafting on Tomato Fruit Quality

“…The fruit quality has been influenced positively ('Emperador') and negatively (Romanian rootstocks) by grafting. Grafting increased the marketable and total yield, while differences in marketable and total fruit number were lower (Moreno et al, 2019).…”

Exogenous salicylic acid alleviates the negative impacts on production components, biomass and gas exchange in tomato plants under water deficit improving redox status and anatomical responses

“…Tomato ( Solanum lycopersicum L.) is an important horticultural crop worldwide due to its wide use in the food industry and consumption in nature and in addition, tomato has nutritional characteristics that are essential for humans (Elbadrawy & Sello, 2016; Vallverdú‐Queralt et al, 2012). Tomato has presented an increase in yield and profitability for producers in the last decades, mainly because of the use of modern cultivars, adoption of new technologies, and agricultural management (Moreno et al, 2019). Studies related to plant physiology and genetics using tomato as plant model has benefitted from the use of the cultivar Micro‐Tom (MT; Carvalho et al, 2011), due to its compact size, short life cycle, known genome, and representativeness to dicotyledonous species of agricultural interest (Emmanuel & Levy, 2002; Meissner et al, 1997).…”

Stability of yield and its components in grafted tomato tested across multiple environments in Texas

“…However, while there are several studies that evaluated the growth and yield performance of grafted tomatoes in protected structure 26 – 29 and open field 30 – 32 , few examined the performance of different scion/rootstock combinations simultaneously in the protected environment (high tunnel) compared to the open‐field system across different locations. These observations indicate that limited information is available on the stability of yield traits of specific scion/rootstock combinations of tomato grown across a range of environments in general and Texas in particular.…”