Int.J.Curr.Microbiol.App.Sci (2019) 8(5): 639-643 639 Original Research Article https://doi.org/10.20546/ijcmas.2019.805.074 Effect of Different Pruning Intensities on Growth and Yield of Nectarine (Prunus persica L.var. nucipersica) cv. Snow Queen Sharbat Hussain 1* , Khalid Rasool Dar 2 , Amit Kumar 1 , Showkat Maqbool 2 , Zaffar Mehdi 2 and M.A. Dar 2 1 Division of Fruit Science, Sher-e-Kashmir University of Agricultural Sciences and Technology of Kashmir-190025, India 2 Faculty of Agriculture, Wadura Sopore, Sher-e-Kashmir University of Agricultural Sciences and Technology of Kashmir-190025, India *Corresponding author ABSTRACT Introduction Nectarines (Prunus persica L. Batsch var. nucipersica) are one of the newly introduced crop in Kashmir valley. The peach and nectarine plants resemble with each other and it is very difficult to distinguish a peach tree from a nectarine tree, except the surface of the fruit skin which is smooth and fuzz less in nectarine. Nectarines are believed to have originated from peach by mutation and the smooth skinned fruit in nectarines is governed by the presence of single recessive gene where as in peaches fuzzy skin is due to a dominant gene. Peach is the third most important temperate fruit crop of India and in Jammu and Kashmir, the area under peach cultivation corresponds to 2523 hectares with an annual production of 5472 Metric tonnes [1] . Nectarines have a habit to produce large numbers of flowers and if the environmental conditions are conducive, may set excessively large number of fruits per tree and thereby reduce the possibility of getting commercial fruit size with quality fruit at harvest [4] . To avoid over cropping, the International Journal of Current Microbiology and Applied Sciences ISSN: 2319-7706 Volume 8 Number 05 (2019) Journal homepage: http://www.ijcmas.com The present investigation was carried to evaluate the effect of different pruning intensities on growth and yield of nectarine cv. Snow Queen at fruit research farm, SKUAST- Kashmir Shalimar Srinagar during the year 2016 and 2017. The experiment was laid out in randomized complete block design with nine pruning treatments and three replications. The results obtained revealed that there is a significant increase in shoot growth and leaf area with highest pruning intensity viz., 2/3rd head back and 20 % thinning out. The results further revealed that with the increase in pruning intensities total yield was reduced however, marketable yield of quality fruits were increased. Highest total yield was obtained in those treatments where minimum pruning intensity i.e. 10 % and 20 % thinning out of the plants was performed. Keywords Growth, Yield, Nectarine, Pruning, Pruning intensity Accepted: 07 April 2019 Available Online: 10 May 2019 Article Info