Model helps to time thinning sprays

摘要

Washington apple growers have a new tooltto help them add a little science to the art of chemical thinning.A computer model is available to help them apply chemical blossom thinners at the optimum time to achieve their target crop load. Historically, growers have applied lime sulfur and fish oil at 20 percent and 80 percent full bloom, with generally good results, said Tory Schmidt, research scientist with the Washington Tree Fruit Research Commission."There's never been anything magical about those timings," he said. "We just felt it was important to get a chemical mmning spray on earlyin bloom and one late during bloom, and that's generally worked out okay for a lot of folks."