Interaction between different pre- and postharvest treatments on shelf life extension of ‘Oregon Spur’ apple

Introduction. Fruit quality characteristics are governed by preharvest factors, mainly climate, nutrition and plant bio-regulators, of which the latter two can easily be manipulated in the grower’s interest. Likewise, the postharvest treatments with the best performance can maintain quality during storage and distribution. Therefore, it is important to embrace a holistic approach to combine the pre- and postharvest practices in view of attaining maximum quality and satisfaction at the consumer level. Materialsandmethods.Various combinations of mineral nutrients (calcium and boron) and bio-regulators (salicylic acid and gibberellic acid) were applied at the pre- and postharvest stages of apple fruits to study their influence on postharvest behavior of these fruits during 60 days of storage under ambient conditions. Results and discussions. Among the different treatments tried, fruits treated with either salicylic acid or calcium showed significant improvement with regards to improved physico-chemical characteristics and reduced fruit infection percentage. Integration of pre- and postharvest application of chemicals was verified as the most effective choice for the improvement of shelf life of apple fruits amongst the treatment combinations applied either at the pre- or postharvest stage. The application of salicylic acid in combination with calcium or boron renders an alternative to the use of fungicides to control decay during apple fruit storage.