Rootstock and Cultivar Effects on Mineral Elements Uptake Efficiency and some Quantitative and Qualitative Characteristics of Apple cvs. Golden Delicious, Fuji and Delbarestival

An experiment was carried out to evaluate the effects of three vegetative rootstocks MM106, MM111, M9 and three commercial cultivars, Golden Delicious, Fuji and Delbarestival on mineral elements uptake efficiency and some quantitative and qualitative characteristics of apple during two growing seasons 2011 and 2012. Yield efficiency, reducing sugars, titrable acidity, pH of fruit juice, tissue firmness and average of fruit weight, N and K of fruit and leaf and also leaf P, Fe, Mn, Zn and B concentration were measured. The most yield efficiency was measured in Delbarestival onto MM106 combination with 0.51 and the least in Fuji onto MM106 and MM111 with 0.17 and 0.18 kgcm-2 of tree cross sectional area, respectively. M9 in N and P uptake was more efficient than the MM111 and MM106, but MM111 and MM106 rootstocks in Fe uptake were more efficient than the M9 rootstock. There were significant positive correlations between leaf K concentration and trees yield efficiency and also between fruit K concentration, fruit weight and fruit juice titrable acidity, so the role of this element in apple trees nutrition is very important.