How it Works and How it Doesn't: Mark Russell
DISCLAIMER: Not necessarily approved or endorsed by PACMAN
Cropload management is the major must for peak orchard profitability, and a critical, season-defining responsibility of the modern orchard manager. For generations this was achieved through good horticulture plus trial-and-error PGR (plant growth regulator) applications at optimal timings, all couched in the grower’s knowledge of their own block history. Now, in just the last few decades, every aspect of apple production has gone through a process of microscopy that has allowed precision to creep into our vocabulary, not just as a theoretical goal, but as a mathematical destination. Rootstocks have greater dwarfing characteristics, trees have gotten smaller, densities have gotten tighter, canopies have decreased in depth.
And so now we have, finally, user-friendly(ish) methods for predicting potential, current, future, and final cropload levels. These include Malusim, which can be found here, the Einhorn Method, known as the Fruitlet Size Distribution Model, found here, and the overall PACMAN project. So why do I get the feeling that there are so few growers actually doing it?
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