Commercial Potential of Red Fuji in 

 New England 



Duane W. Greene and Wesley R. Autio 



Department of Plant and Soil Sciences, University of Massachusetts 



The apple cultivar that is in greatest demand for 

 planting in the United States is Fuji, including its red 

 coloring sports. Interest and popularity of Fuji has 

 preceded an appropriate and thorough evaluation of its 

 commercial potential. Our first evaluation of Fuji was 

 presented in Fruit Notes 54(1):10. It is the purpose of 

 this article is to give an update of our experience 

 growing and evaluating fruit of a strain of Red Fuji. 



We obtained our Red Fuji from the New York 

 Agricultural Experiment Station in Geneva, and we 

 believe that it is the Akifu #1 strain. We began 

 propagating it 4 years ago and have harvested fruit 

 from these trees for the past 2 years at the University of 

 Massachusetts Horticultural Research Center in Bel- 

 chertown. 



Tree Characteristics 



Fuji is a vigorous, nonspur tree (Table 1). It is a 

 diploid that blooms mid- to late-season. Fuji is preco- 

 cious, but it also shows signs of biennial bearing that 

 starts at an early age. It has a spreading growth habit 

 with good crotch angles. After 4 years Fuji/M.9 is at 

 least 30% larger than adjacent Marshall Mclntosh/M.9 

 planted at the same time. 



Fruit Characteristics 



Fuji fruit are firm, crisp, very sweet, subacid, and 

 slightly aromatic (Table 1). Fruit are round to oblate, 

 medium in size, with a roughened skin. The standard 

 strain of Fuji has a pinkish red blush over a yellowish- 

 green ground color. The red coloring strains have 

 much more red that ranges from a cherry red to a 

 darker burgundy maroon. The fruit has good flavor 

 which improves after a period of storage. 



The most notable characteristic of Fuji appears to 

 be its unequaled storage potential. There is no other 

 cultivar that we can grow in the Northeast that main- 

 tains condition and high quality in storage like Fuji. 



In 1988, we harvested Red Fuji on October 24, 

 when flesh firmness averaged 18.5 lbs (Table 2). After 

 22 weeks in regular storage, flesh firmness averaged 

 16.5 lbs. It was noted that firmness could be catego- 

 rized according to fruit ground color. Fruit that had 

 green or green/yellow ground color had flesh firmness 

 of 19.0 and 16.4 lbs, respectively, and the quality was 

 still very good. Fruit with yellow ground color had flesh 

 firmness of 14.1 lbs and a bland taste. 



Time of Ripening 



The major factor limiting further planting of Fuji 

 in the Northeast is uncertainty about whether we have 

 a sufficiently long growing season to mature the fruit 

 properly. After the 1988 season it appeared that many 



Fruit Notes, Spring, 1990 



