Characterization of fruits of eleven accessions of jackfruit

An investigation was carried out to study the characterization of eleven accessions of jackfruit at five different harvesting times. Eleven accessions were taken to study the physical characteristics and chemical characteristics. It was conducted at the BAU-GPC, Bangladesh Agricultural University, Mymensingh during the period from March to December. Physical characteristics of fruit such as weight of fruit, bulb, seed, rind and axis; skin colour, number of bulbs per fruit, nature, flavour and sweetness of bulbs and chemical characteristics such as total soluble solids, moisture, dry matter, TSS, pH, Titrable acidity, Ascorbic acid, Reducing sugar, Non reducing sugar, Total sugar contents of jackfruit bulbs were determined. Fruits were harvested at five different time, namely very early harvesting (25 May), early harvesting (4 June), mid harvesting (14 June), late harvesting (24 June) and very late harvesting (4 July). General observations on the physical characteristics of fruits such as texture, fibrousness, juiciness, flavour and sweetness of bulbs were taken at different harvesting time. Weight of fruit, weight of edible and non-edible portions also varied at five different harvesting. Total soluble solids contents were found to be the highest at early harvesting time and the lowest at late harvesting time. Early and mid-harvesting time was found to be better in all accession of jackfruit. Accession number Ah3 was found to be the best in respect of fruit, pulp and seed characteristics, which was followed by Ah1, Ah2, Ah12, Ah15, Ah18 and Ah27. A wide variation in the moisture, dry matter, TSS, pH, Titrable acidity, Ascorbic acid, Reducing sugar, Non reducing sugar, Total sugar contents was observed in the bulbs of eleven accession of jackfruit types considered in the present investigation. The results of the study are helpful for attempting crop improvement and selection of superior desirable jackfruit genotypes for bringing to cultivation.