News - Stone fruit trials give promising results
29 Jan 10
As reported in The Fruit Grower magazine, January 2010.
“Significant advantages can be achieved by the timely storage of stone fruit to extend the marketing season and help ensure that supplies more accurately match demand. This has been demonstrated by English fruit marketing company Norman Collett Ltd’s 2009 trials with plums and cherries.”
Arguably the more practical of the trials was an ozone generator produced by Biofresh, based at the Newcastle University Campus, Newcastle-upon-Tyne. The company supplied a small refrigerated trailer equipped with the generator for the trial. It was used for both plums and cherries and the results were “unbelievable”. The fruit was kept in the in the trailer for four weeks at 1C.”
Ozone works because it is a strong oxidising agent. As such it kills the bacterial and fungal pathogens that cause spoilage of the fruit. “We only put half a dozen trays of Regina in the trailer because cherries are very expensive,” says Jenner. “After a month they had no rots at all, only a bit of shrivel. Next year we’ll use more commercial volumes.”