Phenological observations made in adult coffee crops, under tropical conditions of Brazil, indicated that flowering buds complete the maturation and reach to the dormancy of the buds, being ready for the main flowering when the accumulated value of potential evapotranspiration (ETp), starting from April, reaches about 350 mm and a minimum amount of rainfall of 10 mm is necessary so that the mature buds are induced to antesis, such as the original model. The objective was the parametrization and validation of the agrometeorological model for estimating the beginning of the full flowering period for arabic coffee for the conditions of the State of São Paulo. Phenological observations of adult coffee crops, variety Mundo Novo and Catuaí, were obtained from arhieves of the Instituto Agronomico (IAC), in Campinas, for two tropical areas, Campinas and Mococa, during the years of 1993 to 2005. Different accumulated values of ETp and Growing Degree Days (GDD) and values of minimum rainfall (1 to 10 mm) also were considered. The parametrized agrometeorological model, that considers the accumulated values of ETp (335 mm) or GDD (1579), for the flower buds to reach the maturation, and a minimum value of 7 mm of rainfall presented better capacity to indicate the period of the full flowering for arabic coffee plants, with minors errors of estimating comparing to the original model.
Coffea arabica L.; climate; phenology; floral buds maturation; flowering
