Harvest time and storage conditions of ‘Star Ruby’ grapefruit (Citrus paradisi Macf.) for short distance summer consumption
Olivier Pailly , Gilles Tison and Audric Amouroux
Postharvest Biology and Technology Volume 34, Issue 1 , October 2004, Pages 65-73
2004
บทคัดย่อ
The effects of harvest date (four 3-week-spaced dates from early May to end of June) and storage temperature (6 and 10 °C) on grapefruit weight loss, decay and internal quality were evaluated at two given periods (early July and end of August). Harvest dates were before flowering (BF), at full bloom (FB), after flowering (AF) and 6 weeks after full bloom (6FB). Fruitinternal quality was assessed by the percentage of juice (PJU), total soluble solids (TSS), titrable acidity (TA) and TSS:TA ratio. on orchard, between the first and the last harvest dates, PJU and TSS and TA decreased whereas TSS:TA increased sharply. PJU remained quite unchanged until after flowering, where it sharply declined leading to values near the minimum for marketing in 6FBfruitespecially for small diameter ones. No clearchilling injurieswere noticed even after more than 16 weeks at 6 °C. That temperature induced higher TA, lower TSS:TA ratio values and lowerfruitweight loss than at 10 °C. Small diameterfruitweight loss was higher than that of large diameterfruitfor both temperatures. For all harvest dates TSS, TA and TSS:TA were similar at the two tested periods for marketing (early July and end of August). By August, PJU of BFfruitwas lower and close to the minimum value for marketing. Conversely, harvest date had a clear influence on decay with 30.7% of decay in BFfruitversus 5.5% in 6FBfruitby the end of experiment (end of August) mainly due to a longer storage duration and not to a higher sensitivity to decay of BFfruit.For short distance local summer marketing, we recommend to harvest grapefruit after flowering, but not too late, and to store them at 10 °C.