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Improving early-season estimates of olive production using airborne pollen multi-sampling sites

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Abstract

The aim of this study was to improve the accuracy of aeropalynological models to forecast yields in areas with heterogeneous characteristics by applying principal component analysis to integrate the airborne pollen sampled from more than one trap. The sampling was performed during the past seven years (1998–2004) in the main northeast olive regions of Portugal. Annual crop production was forecasted on the basis of airborne pollen concentration measured at flowering, comparing the performance of three different independent variables: total airborne pollen concentration sampled in each trap and a derived variable that was determined by principal component analysis of the total airborne pollen concentration sampled. The best predictive results were obtained using a logarithmic relationship with airborne pollen concentration principal component scores describing about 97% of olive fruit production variability over the last seven years. The use of this technique improved the ability of pollen to explain the production interannual variations by about 13%. The comparison between actual reported and the adjusted production showed an average spread deviation of 5%.

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Abbreviations

APC:

Airborne pollen concentration

FOC:

Vila Nova de Foz-Côa

MPS:

Main pollination season

PCA:

Principal components analysis

VAD:

Valença do Douro

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Acknowledgments

The first author would like to thank the Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia SFRH/BD/13148/2003 for support.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Secção Autónoma de Ciências Agrárias, Faculdade de Ciências da Universidade do Porto, Porto, Portugal

    Helena Ribeiro & Mário Cunha

  2. Departamento de Botânica, Faculdade de Ciências da Universidade do Porto, Rua do Campo Alegre, 1191, 4150, Porto, Portugal

    Helena Ribeiro & Ilda Abreu

  3. CECA-ICETA, Universidade do Porto, Vairao, Portugal

    Mário Cunha

  4. IBMC, Instituto de Biologia Molecular e Celular, Universidade do Porto, Porto, Portugal

    Ilda Abreu

Authors
  1. Helena Ribeiro
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  2. Mário Cunha
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  3. Ilda Abreu
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Correspondence to Helena Ribeiro.

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Ribeiro, H., Cunha, M. & Abreu, I. Improving early-season estimates of olive production using airborne pollen multi-sampling sites. Aerobiologia 23, 71–78 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10453-007-9050-6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10453-007-9050-6

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