Abstract
Two introduced French-type plantain (Musa, AAB) clones, Maiden and Dominican Red, were evaluated to determine the effect of bunch pruning on fruit grade and marketable yield. Pruning treatments consisted in the removal of the male floral bud and lower hands from the immature bunch to maintain either four, five or six uppermost hands. The false-horn type clone Maricongo with the unpruned bunch was used as a control. A reduction in the number of hands from six to four in bunches of the French type clones significantly increased bunch mean fruit weight and individual fruit weight per hand. Regardless of the pruning treatment, the French type clones produced significantly more fruits per bunch than the false-horn type Maricongo with the unpruned bunch. There was no significant difference among the French-type clones for number of fruits per bunch when pruned to either four, five or six uppermost hands. These clones averaged 54, 66 and 77 fruits with their bunches pruned to four, five and six hands, respectively. The false-horn-type Maricongo with unpruned bunches produced 48 fruits. However, regardless of the pruning treatment, bunches from Maiden were always significantly heavier than those of Dominican Red and the unpruned Maricongo. Bunches of Maiden pruned to four, five and six hands weighed 23.3, 25.4, and 26.7 kg, respectively. Unpruned Maricongo bunches weighed 20.1 kg. The French-type Maiden plantain with bunches pruned to five uppermost hands yielded 177,271 marketable fruits/per hectare, equivalent to 68,326 kg/ha. This amount represented a significant yield difference of 47,344 marketable fruits per hectare (14,257 kg/ha) when compared to the unpruned Maricongo bunches. All fruits obtained from the Maiden plantain bunches pruned to five hands exceeded the local market fruit weight criterion of 270 g, including fruits in the distal hand, which compared favorably in size with fruits in the fifth hand of the unpruned bunch of Maricongo.