EXPERIMENTS ON THE PHOTOPERIODIC RESPONSE IN PINEAPPLE

Gowing , Donald P. (Pineapple Research Institute of Hawaii, Honolulu.) Experiments on the photoperiodic response in pineapple. Amer. Jour. Bot. 48(1): 16–21. 1961.—The initiation of flowering of ‘Smooth Cayenne’ pineapple plants is neither strictly a response to photoperiod (day lengths of 10 hr. 51 min.–13 hr. 24 min.) nor to a minimum temperature (minima from 50° to 72°F. in different areas) under natural Hawaiian conditions. Depending on the kind of planting material used and the time of planting, natural initiation of flowering may take place any month of the year. Slips planted in the fall generally initiate flowering in December of the following year. However, exposure of an 8-mo.-old slip-planting to a day length of 8 hours for 40 days starting Sept. 8 induced flowering irrespective of night temperatures from about 60 to 80°F. Interruption of the dark period by illumination at 30 ft.-c. from midnight to 1 a.m. suppressed the inductive effect. Lowering the night temperature to 60°F. was, of itself, non-inductive. Field-grown, 11-mo.-old plants treated in place responded similarly, in that 25 periods of 8-hr. day length starting Sept. 5 induced 60% of the plants to flower, and the night illumination suppressed the inductive effect as before. Daily application of 0.12 mg. of the major native pineapple auxin (indole-3-acetic acid) at the beginning of the dark period had no detectable effect on the short-day treatment, and similar application of an antiauxin (4-chlorophenoxyisobutyric acid) did not affect the suppression of flowering by the light-break. Supplemental illumination of field-grown 12-mo. plants to provide a photoperiod of more than 15 hr. daily from Nov. 4 to Jan. 30 did not suppress the natural initiation of flowering which occurred in early December (day length about 10 hr. 50 min.). ‘Smooth Cayenne’ pineapple is therefore a quantitative, but not an obligate, short-day plant.