Mud fruit

~Geoff Langford

We have just spent some time going though our trial block removing early flowers.  It is a pain to do.  There is the psychological impact that you are taking off all this potential fruit that could be very valuable, as well as the inherent physical difficulty of taking off these flowers and fruit trusses that are held so close to the crown.  Doing that without damaging the crown is really hard, so not a job you can give to just anyone.

Talking to an Auckland grower recently, he was saying that there seemed to be more of this mud fruit this year and that is our experience as well.  Hard to know what conditions have contributed to this but obviously healthy plants combining with specifics in the climate since planting have contributed to really good flower development.  A bit of a shame really.

Our past experience with this removal is that the only variety that did not benefit from this early flower removal was Albion.  When the flower was left on all the others, the fruit developed but because the leaf to fruit ratio was poor, the flavour was poor.  It always had a big white shoulder and because it sat close to the plant, it would get every disease going, was often mis-shapen and when field grown, would be dirty from sitting in the mud.   Hence the term mudfruit.  The result is an awful lot of un-marketable fruit which will just tell customers that strawberries are not worth buying.  Not a good outcome.

In the South Island in years gone by, growers would rely on frosts at this time of year doing the job for them.  Given the move to covered crops, this approach is less reliable so no choice but to go through and remove this early flower.  Good luck!

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