Post-harvest tree nutrition

Crop loads place great demand on trees up until harvest, so assisting nutrient accumulation for next season is vital to building strong buds and healthy foliage.

A post-harvest application of YaraVita Bud Builder FL delivers essential nutrients for trees to store overwinter which helps to stimulate photosynthesis and better flowering and fruit-set next spring when cool air and soil temperatures can inhibit leaf development and nutrient uptake via the roots.

Mark Redshaw, North Island Agronomist for Yara Crop Nutrition, says Bud Builder FL supplies critical nutrients at the right ratio prior to trees beginning to go dormant for winter.

“Developed as a ready-made solution for the post-harvest period, YaraVita Bud Builder Flo is a high analysis, suspension concentrate product containing a balance of key nutrients for top fruit production. It’s an easy-to-pour, flowable liquid with wide tank-mix compatibilities. It’s crop-safe, rainfast and cost effective. And, being a flowable composite product, you’ve also got less containers taking up space in the spray shed.”

Bud Builder FL contains magnesium, zinc and boron. Magnesium delays leaf senescence and maximises nutrient remobilisation as trees prepare for autumn leaf-fall. Zinc and boron need to be available to the tree early in the season to aid flowering and fruit-set, the movement of sugars, and the function of many enzymes.

Mark says nutrient deficiency symptoms are not always obvious. “That’s why plant and soil sample analysis, as well as checking for visual symptoms, should be routine practice. Nutrients supplied in the correct form, at the correct crop-specific ratios, through a combination of what is available from the soil, supplemented by appropriately timed fertiliser applications at the correct rate, are all important for achieving optimal crop yield and quality as well as improving tree performance.”