Table apricot growing on Taurus Mountains

There is a big demand for table apricots in Turkey, for both domestic and foreign markets. Turkey is producing very early season table apricots starting from the middle of May at the coastal line of the Mediterranean and dried apricots late in the summer at the Malatya region. We tried to grow mid-season table apricots on the Taurus Mountains. Although the elevation from the sea level is 1100 m and the winters are rather cold, the spring frosts are not very effective. Therefore we established adaptation plots with selected Turkish cultivars in the Pozanti Research Station of Çukurova University (POZ-MER) about 14 years ago. According to the results of the pomological analyses, yield and appearances, Sakit-2, Sakit-6, Karacabey as local cultivars, and, Roxana, Rouge du Roussillon, Screara and P. de Colomer as foreign cultivars were found recommendable for the Taurus mountains