Extending harvest season and shelf life and improving quality characters of Barhee dates

The present study was conducted in order to extend harvest season and maintain fruit qualityfor better marketability of Barhee date palms growing in Riyadh in Saudi Arabia. Palms were bypreharvest foliar sprayed at the hababouk stage and at the beginning of fruit color break with 10 ppmCPPU ‘cytophex’, 8Mm putrescine (PUT) and 50 ppm each of Gibberellin A3 (GA3), 1-Naphthaleneaceticacid (NAA), 6-Benzylaminopurine (BA) and salicylic acid (SA). Harvest date was delayed by one monthwith NAA and GA3, three weeks with putrescine and SA, and by two weeks with cytophex and BA fromthe commercial harvest date. All treatments decreased skin color intensity and carotenoids content andincreased acidity as compared with control. The fruits turning to the postharvest rutab stage and thepercent of total soluble solids (TSS) loss during storage at 0°C and 85-90% relative humidity werereduced by all treatments. The percentage of fruits reaching rutab stage during storage was 12.25,16.25, 22.34, 12.4, 37.33, and 24.33, in the first season, for NAA, GA3, cytophex, putrescine, BA andSA, respectively. The corresponding value for the second season was 11.32, 18.46, 31.38, 19.45, 33.33and 20.33%, respectively. The incidence of postharvest fruit decay during cold storage did notsignificantly differ among all sprayed growth regulators. The GA3, NAA and putrescine treatments hadsignificant higher effect in extending shelf life and decreasing fruit weight loss percent than the othertreatments. It is concluded that the sprayed growth regulators had positive influence on extendingharvest season and shelf life of Barhee dates without any deterioration in fruit characteristics before andduring cold storage.