FRUIT VARIABILITY IN KINNOW MANDARIN (CITRUS RETICULATA)

Kinnow mandarin is hybrid of King and Willow leaf. The cultivar has extreme variability in all fruit characteristics which is undesirable for fresh fruit export. Twelve lots of good looking, healthy clean fresh fruits were taken from different locations. The characteristics studied were fruit and peel weight, fruit volume, diameter, height, number of segments, seed shapes, total seeds, aborted seeds, seed embryony, juice pH and juice Brix. The fruit weight ranged from 101-287 grams, volume 110-300 ml, diameter 5.2-8.5 cm, fruit height 4.2-7.0 cm, number of segments per fruit 8-12, the fruit central core solid to hollow, fruit peel weight 24-71 grams, total seeds including aborted seeds 4-37, while developed seeds per fruit 3-35, developed seeds have 2-5 different shapes. Both mono and polyembryonic seeds were present in fruits of Kinnow lots. The lowest seed number was found in marker fruits. The fruit juice pH ranged 3.5-4.4 and the fruit juice Brix ranged 8-12.5 at the end of January, indicating the differences in the physiological maturity time of different fruits. The variability in Kinnow fruit orchards can be exploited for selection of superior quality strains