Hand thinning is the manual removal of fruit and is one management tool to reduce crop load to increase fruit size before harvest.

It is the most precise and least risky method of thinning, but very labour intensive.

For hand thinning to be economically viable, significant increases in market returns would have to be achieved to offset the costs.

This Primefact covers the following topics:

• District trials
• Timing
• Crop density levels
• Hand thinning methods
• Combined thinning strategies