Hand and Machine Pollination of Kiwifruit

Two artificial pollination field trials were carried out in Central Chile (32°S. Lat.) during the 1999-2000 season with ‘Hay-ward’ kiwifruit plants (Actinidia deliciosa (Chev.) Liang et Ferguson). The treatments for both trials used pollen collected from ‘Matua’ and included: flower to flower hand pollination; hand pollination using a velvet pad attached to a handle; and mechanical pollination using a portable pollen (1:1, pollen: licopodium) dusting machine; and a control treatment without artificial pollination. Trial 1 did not include bee hives as did Trial 2. In Trial 2, half of the selected shoots in each plant were isolated from bee pollination by means of a light fabric bag. A block design with 5 replications of one plant each was used in Trial 1, while in Trial 2 a fully random split plot (with and without isolation) with 5 replications was used. In both trials, flower to flower and pad pollination increased fruit set, fruit size, seeds and fertilized locules per fruit. Mechanical pollination also increased these variables but to a lesser degree. In the split plot design carried out in the Trial 2, even though there was an interaction between isolation and pollination treatment, the supplementary bee pollination tended to increase fruit size, seeds and fertilized locules per fruit.