Abstract

Chinese chestnut (Castanea mollissima Blume) has noteworthy ecological, economic and cultural importance in the Northern Hemisphere. The low yield of chestnut often affect the economic efficiency. Ovary development is an important step in nut production. Changes in nutrient contents during ovary development in chestnut cultivar ‘Yanshanzaofeng’ have not been thoroughly investigated. In this study, cultivar ‘Yanshanzaofeng’ and ‘Dabanhong’ were used as material. About 50~100 pollinated female inflorescences were picked every five days (5, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30, 35, 40, 45, 50 days) to determine N, P, K, fat, total soluble sugar, crude protein and starch contents. The results indicated that the contents of total soluble sugar, starch and fat increased constantly in ovaries after self-and cross-pollination, but protein, N and K contents first increased in 20 DAP (day after pollination) and after that decreased in the stage of young fruit development. The changes of P has two peak values, one was in 40 DAP and the other was in 50 DAP. P and crude protein were not significantly after pollination treatments. However, N, sugar, starch, fat and K were significantly higher in cross-pollination treatment it seems that these nutrient has a decisive role during ovary development in chestnut. The characteristics of these nutrition changes provide a basis information for spraying N, P, K etc during ovary development and may have the potential to improve nut yield.

Keywords:

Castanea mollissima blume, nutrition, ovary, pollination,

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