Kiwifruit is a dioecious fruit tree, requiring cross-pollination between male and female plants to bear fruit. Natural pollination can lead to deformed or small fruit due to poor pollination, so growers use artificial pollination . There are four main methods for pollinating kiwifruit:
1. Cross-pollination
Direct pollination involves placing the anthers of an open male flower directly onto the stigma of a female flower. Collect freshly opened male flowers from the morning of the day, place the petals on a plate, and gently rub the anthers of the male flower onto the stigma of the female flower. Each male flower can pollinate 7-8 female flowers. Direct pollination is slow and inefficient, suitable only for small-scale operations.
2. Dry powder inoculation
Dry pollen application involves preparing a mixture of male and female pollen , placing it in a soft plastic bottle, sealing the bottle, inserting a plastic pipette , and squeezing and spraying it onto the stigma of the female flower. Another common method is to load the mixed pollen into a syringe and apply it directly to the stigma of the female flower. Dry pollen application is generally suitable for small-area applications.
3. Pollination using a pollinator
Pollinator pollination is currently the most popular pollination method. It uses a battery-powered small fan to evenly distribute mixed pollen from a nozzle, which is then continuously moved towards the female flower for pollination. Generally, one imported pollinator can pollinate about 10 acres per person per day, which is 15-20 times more efficient than manual pollination. It also saves pollen and is unaffected by weather. Pollinator pollination will be the main method of manual pollination for kiwifruit in the future, offering extremely high efficiency.
4. Air pollination
Wind pollination is a method of pollinating kiwifruit used abroad. For male and female varieties that bloom at the same time, when the male flowers open, a large mechanical sprayer is operated between the rows of trees. The wind blown by the sprayer spreads the pollen from the male flowers, achieving a natural wind pollination effect.
