High Density Orcharding in Fruit Crops: A Review

Abstract

Soil application of paclobutrazol resulted in a significant increase in flowering and slightly earlier flowering whereas a combination of soil application of paclobutrazol (1.0gm/canopy diameter/tree) and soil drench application 8 weeks after paclobutrazol treatment induced very early flowering. Twenty year-old mango trees (Manqifera indica L.) Cv. Dashehari planted in high density system (2.5m x 2.5m) was hard pruned. Three weeks later, as the new flushes expanded, paclobutrazol was applied to soil by spraying the basin. It was found that the third and fourth flushes of the treated trees were significantly shorter than that of the control, and their intermodal lengths were remarkably reduced. The canopy sizes of the treated trees were significantly reduced in height and speeded once year. This gave the optimal canopy size for high density planting while the canopy of the control trees became overlapping. High density orcharding is one of the recent novel concepts of increasing productivity without affecting quality of fruits. It gives earlier production and return per unit area, shortens juvenility provides efficient resources. Dwarfing root stocks play key role to accommodate more number of plants per unit area. Under HDP has been found most suitable technique for some tropical and subtropical fruits accommodating more number of plants per unit area viz., Dashehari mango (1333 plants/ha), guava (5000 plants/ha), papaya (6400 plants/ha), Highest yield (6.4 MT/ha) was recorded with a spacing of 5 m x 5 m without reduction in fruit size in 15 year old plants compared to the mean yield of 1.12 MT/ha in 10m x 10m normal spacing. High density plantation helped to get significantly higher yield per unit area compared to the normal spacing, without affecting size and quality of mango fruits. The present findings show promise for more yield and returns per unit area during the initial years of mango plantation by adopting 2.5m x 2.5m high density planting.