ABSTRACT
I. INTRODUCTION A. What Is a Fruit? The biblical phrase “the precious fruits of the earth” can be taken far more literally than the epistle writer probably imagined. There is very little in agriculture that does not depend on the development of fruits. By definition, a fruit is the end product of a matured ovary. This end product can vary from being a single seed such as a grain of any cereal (e.g., wheat, rice, rye, oats, or barley) to being a fleshy, succulent structure (e.g., peach, pear, or watermelon). All nut crops, including peanuts (or “ground nuts”), are technically fruits, as are the products of oil palm, coconuts, rape (canola), flax (linseed), and other plants grown for extraction of edible or industrial oils. Even many root and pasture crops are dependent on fruit setting to provide seed for sowing the next crop. Root and tuber crops grown from vegetative propagules are an obvious exception, but their genetic improvement by plant breeders is dependent on flowering, pollination, and fruit setting to provide seed with which to start improved varieties. It should also be noted that many “vegetables,” including tomatoes, peas, beans, cucumbers, squash, peppers (capsicums), eggplant (aubergine), and okra (lady’s fingers), are botanically fruits.
