Determination of The Harvesting Time of Hass Cultivarin Antalya Conditions

Abstract

Avocado cultivation in the world and Turkey, especially Hass cultivar,increases rapidly in recent years. The fruit quality of avocado is directly relatedto harvest maturity and post-harvest ripening process and the identification ofmaturity index has a very large commercial importance. For this purpose; inthe fruit samples of Hass cultivar taken at 15-20 days interval from October toJune, some fruit quality traits (dry matter, flesh firmness, weight loss, taste,colour of fruit skin and flesh) during the harvest and ripening process andrelationships between of these parameters were analysed. As a result, it wasfound that the most reliable maturity index was the dry matter (DM) contentand that there was a direct relationship between its accumulation and theharvesting time. In cases these index values were insufficient, the otherpostharvest analyses (taste, fruit skin colour, fruit hardness and weight loss)made a contribution to determination of maturity. During the ripening process,very high levels of a positive correlation between harvest time and dry matter(r= 0.92 to 0.96) was observed. According to the fruit maturity of the Hasscultivar, three different harvest periods were defined as early, optimum (mostsuitable) and late harvests. It was determined that from early October to lateDecember as early harvest (23-25% DM), from January to late May asoptimum harvest (26-37% DM), and from beginning to end of June as lateharvest (≥38% DM).