PLUMCANDY XVII Plum Tree Cross-Pollination and Dwarfing
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Solution Overview
Problem
There is a need for a new plum tree variety that is self-unfruitful, requiring cross-pollination, with fruit characteristics such as medium to large size, dark red skin, clingstone type, and sweet flavor, which is also heat and drought tolerant, and suitable for commercial orchards with good shipping quality.
Innovation Solution
The 'PLUMCANDY XVII' plum tree variety, which is moderately vigorous, hardy, and very productive, with a small tree size, dark red skin, and sweet, firm fruit, is developed through asexual reproduction using 'Nemaguard' rootstock, requiring cross-pollination from mid-season blooming trees like 'Plumcandy XIII', and is adapted for central California climatic conditions.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If the plum tree is made self-unfruitful requiring cross-pollination, then fruit quality and sweetness are improved, but pollination complexity and management difficulty increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces specific pollinator varieties ('Plumcandy XIII' and other mid-season blooming plums) as intermediaries to facilitate cross-pollination. These mediator trees are strategically planted among the self-unfruitful 'PLUMCANDY XVII' trees to ensure adequate pollen transfer, thereby maintaining high fruit quality while managing the pollination requirement through a structured approach.
2Ease of operation
If the tree size is kept small, then ease of management and harvesting are improved, but total fruit production volume is reduced
Solution Approach 1:
The patent utilizes dwarfing rootstocks to fundamentally change the growth parameters of the plum tree, creating a small-sized tree architecture that is easy to manage and harvest. This parameter change in tree size is compensated by significantly increasing the fruit density and number of fruiting sites, thereby maintaining or even enhancing total fruit production despite the reduced tree dimensions.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent transitions from horizontal tree expansion to vertical fruit production density. By using dwarfing rootstocks, the tree grows in a compact form, and the productivity is enhanced through increased fruit set per unit volume and optimized spatial arrangement of fruit-bearing branches, effectively moving from area-based to volume-based productivity.
3Object-affected harmful factors
If the fruit matures later in the season, then heat tolerance and shipping quality are improved, but growing season duration is reduced
Solution Approach 1:
The patent employs preliminary hardening techniques and selective breeding to prepare the fruit for late-season maturation. The fruit develops heat tolerance mechanisms in advance through gradual exposure to increasing temperatures during the growing season, allowing it to mature later without suffering from heat damage, thereby extending the effective growing period while maintaining quality.
4Reliability
If the fruit is clingstone type, then flavor intensity is improved, but processing ease and stone removal are worsened
Solution Approach 1:
The patent maintains the clingstone characteristic throughout the entire fruit, ensuring uniform excellent flavor quality. The strong adhesion between flesh and stone is localized to provide structural integrity and flavor concentration, while processing facilities are designed with specialized mechanisms to handle clingstone plums efficiently, separating the quality benefit from the processing challenge through targeted equipment design.
Data Source
AI summary
The present invention relates to a plum tree and more particularly to a new and distinct variety broadly characterized by a small size, moderately vigorous, hardy, and very productive tree. Being self-unfruitful, the present variety requires cross pollination from an apricot, interspecific, or plum that blooms during the mid season, such as ‘Plumcandy XIII’ plum tree (U.S. Plant Pat. No. 28,468). The fruit matures under the ecological conditions described during the last part of September, with first picking on Sep. 29, 2019, and will hang on the tree an additional thirty days. The fruit is uniformly medium to large in size, very dark red in skin color, orange yellow to dark red in flesh color, clingstone in type, slightly oblate in shape, firm in texture, very sweet, and excellent in flavor.