Rootstock-scion interactions of selected Annona species

Annona species are commonly grown in home gardens of Sri Lanka. The nutritive value of Annona fruits and their value in the fruit processing sector have been realized recently. This has increased the demand for planting material. Use of seedlings as planting material generally resulted in extended vegetative growth, low productivity, inferior fruit quality and inconsistency in yield and quality. Vegetatively propagated plants of superior varieties will solve some of these problems. This study was therefore undertaken at the Horticultural Research and Development Institute, Gannoruwa during Maha season 2006/2007, to identify suitable rootstock species for some selected promising Annona accessions. Soursop ( Annona muricata L.) , cherimoya ( A. cherimola Mill) and atemoya ( A. squamosa × A. cherimola ) scion varieties were grafted on to soursop, cherimoya and sweetsop ( A. squamosa L . ) rootstocks . The experimental design was based on two factor factorial set in Completely Randomized Design with three replications, with 15 plants in each treatment. Percentage success in grafting was much less than the percentage bud take-on showing need for improvement of grafting . Atemoya and soursop were successfully grafted on to cherimoya rootstock (83.3 and 73.3% respectively). Soursop scion grafted on to any one of the rootstock species showed the least successful combination (33%). The scion growth, indicated as length of the first shoot and leaf production (number of leaves/graft/week), depended on the rootstock- scion combination. Keywords: Annona , grafting, interaction, rootstock species, scion. doi: 10.4038/jnsfsr.v37i1.460 J.Natn.Sci.Foundation Sri Lanka 2009 37(1): 71-75