As fruit farmers, we know that growing clean and colourful fruits is key to selling: buyers are attracted by the physical appearance of the fruit. However, for a sustainable fruit farming business, we not only want to attract new customers but also keep them coming back everyday. The only sure way to create a huge base of return customers is to produce fruits that are rich in flavour. Taste is unforgettable and irrespective of how good a fruit looks, if it doesn’t taste as good, we lose the buyers.
So how do we make our fruits sweet?
The
amount of sugar content in your fruits is measured in Brix; the higher
the brix, the sweeter the fruit. A higher brix is achieved when the plant is
able to take up nutrients and water from the soil efficiently and convert them
into sugars. Sufficient exposure to sunlight is very important in aiding the
process of photosynthesis through which the plants manufacture sugars.
 |
| Fruit farming: How to improve the taste of your fruits |
Also Read: How To Grow The Best Tangerine For The Market In Kenya
Here
are some steps you can take to improve the brix of your plats and keep those
customers coming back for more of your sweet fruits.
1. Maintain the right soil nutrient ratio
Please
take note that we are talking about the ratio and not the amounts
of the specific nutrients. Plants essentially need 3 main nutrients for healthy
growth: Nitrogen (N), Phosphorous (P) and Potassium (K). These are the elements
denoted by NPK in fertilisers.
During
the early stages, the best growth will be achieved if you maintain these
elements such that we have about 30% to 60% nitrogen, 30% to 60% potassium and
10% to 30% Phosphorous.
However,
when the plant gets to fruiting stage, you should reduce nitrogen and increase
potassium. This is because excessive nitrates burn carbohydrates in the plant hence
reducing the fruits brix (the measure of sugar content in a fruit).
 |
| Passion fruit at fruiting stage |
So,
if you are still adding lots of manure to your fruiting plants, you are
reducing the sugar content of the fruits and damaging their flavour – manure is
rich in nitrogen. Also check the contents of the fertilizer you use to
top-dress your fruiting plants to ensure they have a higher K than N and P.
Also Read: How to produce Big Juicy Apples
2. Ensure sufficient soil moisture
I
have heard some people saying that if you irrigate your plants during fruiting
the fruits will be tasteless. That is far from the truth. Your plants need
sufficient water for them to be able to absorb the nutrients in the soil.
Plants absorb nutrients in solution form.
It
will be of no use to have balanced nutrients in your soil with no water: the
plant will not be able to absorb these nutrients.
Please
note that I said sufficient – not too low and also not too high. If you over
irrigate your plants, the roots “drown” and absorption of nutrients is again
impeded.
3. Expose your plants to maximum sunlight
Plants
use sunlight in the process of photosynthesis in which the leaves of the plant
transform carbon dioxide and water into chemical energy that is stored in the
plants as glucose. It is this glucose that gives the fruits the sweet taste.
So,
if you grow your fruit plants in a shaded place, do not expect the fruits to be
sweet. For this reason, if your fruit orchard is planted in rows, ensure that the
rows run from East to West and not from North to South.
If
your rows run North to South, the rows to the East cast shadows on the rows to
the West of your farm in the morning and the reverse happens in the late
afternoon. As a result, your plants are only
exposed to full sunlight around noon resulting in lower photosynthesis hence
lower brix (fruit sweetness).
On
the other hand, if your rows are in an East-West alignment, all the plants get
sunlight all day long.
4. Keep the soil pH at the recommended level
Soil
pH is a measure of how acidic or basic your soils are. The pH scale ranges from
1 to 14 where 7 is neutral. If your soils have a pH of less that 7, they are
acidic and if the scale is higher than 7 then they are basic.
Soil
pH affects the availability of nutrients to your plants. In highly acidic or
alkaline soils, phosphorous and many micronutrients important in improving the
fruit brix are less available to the plant.
Most
plants will perform best in soils of pH between 6.0 and 7.5. Out of this range,
the plants might struggle and grow but the sweetness of the fruits will be
severely affected since the plant’s nutrient uptake is seriously hampered.
Different
plants grow optimally in different pH levels. Most fruits will grow best and
have higher brix in slightly acidic soils of between 5 and 6.5 pH. But be sure
to check the best levels for the specific fruit you are growing.
The
good thing is that soil pH can be adjusted to suit your crop. If it is too low
(meaning the soil is acidic), use agricultural lime to bring it down to the
optimum level. If it is too high, use ammonium-based fertilisers or organic
matter. The quantities of the corrective components will be determined by the pH
level. Recommendations will be given to you if you use professional soil
testing services such as CropNut in Limuru, Soil-Care or KALRO to establish
your soil’s pH.
 |
| Hass avocado tree at fruiting stage |
5. Apply seaweed extracts on our plants
Seaweed
extracts are products that can be applied on the crop as foliar on drenched
into the soil around the rooting area of your plants. Although some brands of seaweed
extracts have trace nutrients, they are technically not fertilisers: they are
bio-stimulants.
Simply
put, seaweed extracts are biological products derived from sea weeds and
containing plant growth hormones. When applied on crops, they help to improve
the plant’s photosynthesis and efficient uptake and utilization of soil nutrients,
irrespective of the composition of the soil. It works like a miracle boost.
From
our earlier discuss, you can clearly see that this would result in higher brix.
An added advantage is that seaweed extracts also trigger fruit ripening while
also increasing the hardness of the fruits. As such, the fruit ripens fast but
still with a good keeping quality.
There are many brands of seaweed extracts in Kenya. You can simply walk into an agrovet and ask for a seaweed-based bio-stimulant. Remember, this is not a substitute for fertilizer but a product aimed at helping your plant uptake and efficiently use the nutrients in the soil.
6. Plant the sweeter varieties
We have said much in the paragraphs above but this last one could be the most important: choose the right variety to plant. Fruit sweetness can and actually is influenced to a great extent by the genetic makeup of a specific variety.
Let me give you an example: the solo sunrise and calina IPB9 varieties of pawpaw are the sweetest compared to mountain pawpaw and others: we cant even mention the big indigenous varieties here because those were actually bitter. Even if you got all the other 5 points right and missed on this one, all your efforts of becoming a successful fruit farmer will never pay.
