WILD PEAR ( Pyrus pyraster (L.) Burgsd.) FRUIT AND SEED MORPHOLOGY DEPENDING ON FRUIT SIZE

The current study aims to evaluate the effects of fruit size of wild pear (Pyrus pyraster (L.) Burgsd.) on morphological fruit and seed traits. Wild pear fruit was collected from 10 trees in the area of Zumberacko gorje in the fall of 2022. The fruit was randomly collected from the ground and divided into three groups according to their weight (small (<10g), medium (10 - 15 g) and large (>15 g)). Fruit size had a significant effect on the following morphological traits: fruit weight, fruit length, fruit width, the number of filled seeds, the weight of fresh seeds per fruit, the weight of 1 fresh seed and the weight of air-died seed, while no significant difference was found for fruit shape index, the number of empty seeds, the weight of 1 air dried seed and the share of seed dry matter. For all the aforementioned traits where the difference was significant, large fruit had significantly highest values, while in most cases (with the exception of the weight of 1 fresh seed), medium fruit had significantly higher values than small fruit. Comparing the correlation coefficients between different fruit size groups, it is evident that higher fruit size traits had a significant effect on the number of filled seeds in medium and large wild pear fruit only. In addition, it is visible that fruit weight and width, and not fruit length, had of the largest impact on the number of filled seeds. The principal component analysis revealed3 significant principal components with eigenvalues greater than 1, which explained 75.88% of the total variability. It was shown that large fruit distinguish themselves from small and partly between medium by F1 axis. F1 was mainly influenced by fruit weight, fruit length, fruit width, the number of filled seeds, the weight of fresh seeds per fruit and the weight of air-dried seed per fruit. Based on the results obtained from this study, it can be concluded that for nursery production of wild pear seedlings bigger fruit should be used due to the higher number of filled seeds.