Healthy Fruit - October 10, 2023

Healthy Fruit, Vol. 31, No. 18, October 10, 2023

Prepared by the University of Massachusetts Amherst Fruit Team

Jon Clements, Editor

The way I see it

Jon Clements

The end of a growing season we’d all just as soon forget and move on to next year is near. What else is there to say?
Apple maturity is more or less on track, no freeze events until maybe next week, I’d keep moving on most everything – except Evercrisp maybe – by the end of the week. Evercrisp and Ludacrisp no earlier than next week. Apples do seem kind of loose, fall foliage is not impressive, I expect the slide into winter now to accelerate. Pre-harvest drop has been tolerable, ReTain has been a game changer. Bitter pit was more-or-less a no show this year?
Reminder: presentation by Dr. Lee Kalcsits, Associate Professor and Endowed Chair of Environmental Physiology for Tree Fruit from Washington State University, on October 12th for the UMass Plant Biology Seminar Series. His presentation will be on: Identifying the root causes of bitter pit in apple. The seminar will be held from 3 - 4 PM in the Makepeace room at Cranberry Station in East Wareham. Dr. Kalcsits studies the physiological interactions between environment, genetics, and horticultural management. Here is a link to his Lab Web Page and Google Scholar Profile. For those who cannot make it, here is the Zoom Link.
This will be the LAST “normal” Healthy Fruit for 2023. We will be in the midst of preparing an ‘IPM Report’ for an upcoming meeting of New York, New England, and Canada pest management researchers, Extension staff, and consultants which we will make into the LAST Healthy Fruit for 2023.

Horticulture (apple maturity report)

Jon Clements

All observations from UMass Orchard, Belchertown, MA unless otherwise noted. Target maturity numbers: red color, >50%; firmness, >14 lbs.; soluble solids, >12; DA, 0.60 to 0.40 for Honeycrisp, 0.65 for Gala, 1.00 for Golden Delicious, 1.15 to 1.00 for Red Delicious (higher DA = more "green"); starch index, 4-6. All apple maturity reports here…

2023 Date	Variety	Drop	Diameter (inches)	Color (% red)	Firmness (lbs.)	Brix	Starch Index	DA Meter	Comments	Picture
10/9	Macoun	some	3.2	75	13	12.1	4-7	NA	Very good in terms of flavor now, peak
10/10	Cortland	few	3.4	75	13	12.2	3-6	NA	Still perfectly viable with ReTain
10/9	Delicious	some	3.2	95	14	10.1	4-5-6	NA	One water core, junk
10/9	Golden Delicious	nil	3.4	NA	11	11	6-7	1.14	Ready to start harvest
10/9	Mutsu/ Crispin	nil	3.6	NA	15	10.6	4	1.58	Could use another week
10/9	Cameo ‘Caudle’ cv.	none	3.0	75-100, still dull	16.5	12.2	3-6	0.91	2 with moldy core, not adequately thinned, wait a few more days
10/9	Crimson Gold	significant	3.0	50-75	14	12.4	7	0.22	Attractive, should have harvest a week ago
10/9	Suncrisp (NJ55)	few	3.6	0-10 orange-pink blush	14	13.1	6	0.54	Slightly greasy and punky with light crop, hard to get right
10/9	Cripps Pink (Barnsby cv.)	nil	3.1	90	17	13.8	4-5	0.29	Could do a first pick
10/10	MAIA 1 ‘Evercrisp’	none	3.4	50 dull	21	14	3-4	0.54	Wait a week
10/10	Hudson Golden Gem	few	3.25	0, russet	15	11.5	4-6+	0.96	Tastes like a good pear 🙂

Useful links

UMass Fruit Advisor: http://umassfruit.com

Network for Environment and Weather Applications (NEWA): http://newa.cornell.edu

Follow me on ‘X’ (http://twitter.com/jmcextman) and Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/jmcextman)

The Jentsch Lab (Peter Jentsch, Poma Tech)

Acimovic Lab (Srdjan Acimovic at Virginia Tech)

Tree Fruit Horticulture Updates (Sherif Sherif at Virginia Tech)

CCE ENYCHP Tree Fruit Blog

The next and last for 2023 Healthy Fruit will be published on or about October 31, 2023. In the meantime, feel free to contact any of the UMass Fruit Team if you have any fruit-related production questions.