Spatial variation in ‘Hayward’ kiwifruit dry matter content within a growing region across seasons

Abstract

Between-orchard variation in fruit dry matter (DM) content at harvest of 341 commercial ‘Hayward’ kiwifruit orchards was spatially modelled across a production region over consecutive growing seasons (2003–08). Within seasons there were spatial patterns to the distribution of fruit DM between orchards. The temporal consistency of the spatial variation enabled segregation of the production region into two geographic zones which contained orchards that consistently produced fruit of distinct DM both within and across seasons. The differences in fruit DM between geographic zones were statistically significant, but were not of sufficient magnitude to be of commercial interest. Although the location of an orchard within the production region had an effect on the DM of the fruit produced, orchard location was not predictive of fruit DM. Therefore, it is concluded that in this situation zonation between orchards should not be where the effort in managing variation in fruit quality is concentrated.