Dr.

Suresh Kumar
Assistant Director (Horticulture)
sureshsdhania@gmail.com
Deendayal Upadhyay Centre of Excellence For Organic Farming
CCS Haryana Agricultural University, Hisar
 Juvenility
Flowering is an essential stage of fruit and nut production,
and understanding of factors affecting flowering is
important in determining optimal production practices. An
understanding of the flowering process permits wiser use
of rootstocks, fertilizers, pruning, girdling and growth
regulator chemicals.

Juvenility can be defined as that physiological state of

seedling plant during which it cannot be induced to flower.
This state is followed by a transition phase in which
flowering can occur but not as readily as later, when the
plant grows into the adult phase.

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 Seat of juvenility

The young seedling is juvenile in all of its tissues until it grows into the transition
phase. However, attainment of the transition and ultimately the adult phase does not
alter the juvenile tissues.
Commercial cultivars budded to seedling stocks are entirely adult above the bud union
 Marks of juvenility
Physiological and morphological traits
• Leaf form: vigorous and morphology is different
• Growth form: shoot growth appears whip like (water sprouts) citrus, guava etc
• Presence of thorns: Apple, pear, citrus etc (Juvenile phase- Thorns present)
(Adult phase- Thorns disappear)
• Leaf retention: Semi-evergreen habit (don’t shed leaves in juvenile phase)
• Root emergence: Ease of rooting of (propagation: cutting, stocks)
• Less ribonucleic acid (RNA) …….
Carrier of genetic information
certain genetic information is “turned off” in juvenile plants
information is needed to produce hormones, enzymes etc. necessary for flowering

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 Transition phase
Juvenile phase -----pure juvenile traits
Transition phase----some juvenile and some adult traits
Adult phase----only adult traits
Time interval between J and A depends on growth rate and minimum plant size required

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 Rejuvenation

• Adult phase doesn’t revert back to juvenile

• In plant propagation juvenility is important----cuttings or stocks
(concentration of auxin like IAA is higher in juvenile tissues)
• Plant breeders are interested in shortening the juvenile phase
• Simple buds give rise to flowering or vegetative shoot only e.g. citrus,
coconut, date palm etc
• Mixed buds give rise to both flowering and vegetative shoot
• All fruit buds are flower buds but all flower buds are not fruit buds

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 Factors affecting flower bud differentiation

1. Endogenous factors
(a) Carbon: Nitrogen (C:N) high C:N favors flowering
(b) Genes : synth of eafl gene from juvenile to adult phase. HST (HASTY) promotes
juvenility
2. Environmental factors
(a) Temperature: low chilling requirement
(b) Photoperiod: SDP, LDP, DNP
(c) Light: inner periphery low light intensity so less flowering
outer periphery high light intensity so more flowering
red light (sunlight ) promotes flowering whereas far red light inhibits flowering
3. Mgt factors
(a)Nutrients : N increases veg growth, P helps in protein synth and cell division, K helps in
translocation of sugar
(b) Moisture: moisture deficit extends FBD
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SYMBOL OF TRUST