Determination of the growth potential of strawberry plants (Fragaria × ananassa Duch.) by morphological and nucleotide measurements in relation to chilling

Abstract

Early strawberry fruit production requires that non-dormant strawberry plants be covered during winter. Two methods were used to study the breaking of dormancy of Elsanta strawberry plants following chilling at temperatures below 8 °C. First, a morphological test using the petiole lengths of plants transferred from a nursery to a growth chamber was used. Second, the nucleotide contents before and after incubation of samples in an adenosine solution were measured by bioluminescence. The results show that these two methods can reveal changes in the growth potential of strawberry plants, and, therefore, the release from dormancy. Key words: Dormancy, strawberry plant, nucleotide, growth potential, Fragaria