The Solano Gold cultivar can provide some flexibility in production for California prune growers. Manager of the Prune Breeding Program at UC Davis, Sarah Castro explained the Solano Gold cultivar has several positive attributes for growers. The yellow fruit dries to a dark brown or black color and can have a dry-away ratio as low as two. However, the cultivar might not be good for all producers.
“The caveat behind Solano Gold would be that it harvests there weeks before Improved French. So any operation that were to take advantage of this low dry-away ratio item would need to have the ability to have a drier open that early in the season,” said Castro. “That one blooms about a week and a half before Improved French, so you’d be really spreading your risk. If there’s a catastrophic weather event during Improved French bloom, you would still have a crop with Solano Gold.”
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