Preliminary results of Turkish hazelnut (Corylus colurna L.) populations for testing the nut characteristics

This paper aims to identify the hazelnut characteristics of four different populations (Agli-Tunuslar, Agli-Musellimler, Arac-Guzluk and Tosya-Kucuksekiler) in the North Western Black Sea Region of Turkey, one of the most important areas of economic interest for this species. There, the Turkish hazel (Corylus colurna L.) grows in its optimal conditions and reveals relatively high inter-population and intra-population variation in terms of nut characteristics. With the purpose of assessing variation, measurements were performed in four populations in Kastamonu district on 14 different nut characteristics (number of nuts per cluster, nut length (mm), nut width (mm), nut thickness (mm), shell thickness (mm), nut size (mm), nut shape, compression index, nut weight (g), kernel length (mm), kernel width (mm), kernel thickness (mm), kernel weight (g) and kernel ratio (%) of representative samples of the populations. Significant differences were found out among populations with regard to all of nut characteristics (p<0.05). The four populations have created two groups, population of Agli-Tunuslar and the others, according to cluster analysis. The closest populations have been Tosya-Kucuksekiler and Arac-Guzluk in terms of nut characteristics. According to the results obtained either on population basis or without population discrimination; significant correlations were determined between the majorities of the nut characters. The Arac-Guzluk population showed nuts the biggest among those examined and it is the population which took the highest values in terms of nut size traits while the Tosya-Kucuksekiler provenance showed the highest values with the average values of 5, 15.92 mm, 1.32 and 11.75 mm respectively for nuts per cluster, nut width, compression index and kernel width. The Agli-Tunuslar population showed the highest kernel ratio with 38.2%.