PERFORMANCE OF SELECTED PEACH ROOTSTOCKS ON A SEVERE PEACH TREE SHORT LIFE SITE

Two peach cultivars were budded in 1988 to seedlings from 10 open-pollinated peach and plum lines selected from a 7-year-old peach tree short life (PTSL) field test. Lovell and Nemaguard seedling rootstocks were also budded as controls. The trees were planted in 1989 on a non-fumigated PTSL site near Columbia. South Carolina. Highly significant differences in bloom date, trunk cross-sectional area (TCSA), suckering, bacterial canker infection, and PTSL death were found among the rootstock/scion combinations after four years. Bloom dates when compared to trees on Lovell were advanced by 1-6 days with trees on Blue Goose and BY7446 plums blooming the earliest. Scion TCSA on BY520-8 and BY520-9 peach rootstocks was significantly greater than on Lovell. The plum rootstocks BY7446, Blue Goose, and Edible Sloe had the smallest TCSA. Nemaguard, BY7446, and Edible Sloe had significantly more suckers per tree than Lovell. BY520-9 and Edible Sloe trees had significantly less bacterial canker infection than Lovell. BY520-9, BY7446, and Edible Sloe had the lowest PTSL mortality, and thus hold the most promise as potential rootstocks to replace Lovell on PTSL sites.