3. Results and discussion
3.1. Percent fruit decay
Fungal decay was the major contributor to the loss of strawberry
quality and a considerable variation in percent fruit
decay was found due to various maturity stages (Table 1).
Decay of 1/3rd and 2/3rd matured strawberries during day-1
were 0.88% and 3.00%, respectively, while during day-2 those
were 10.20% and 18.60%, respectively. Decay of 1/3rd and 2/
3rd matured fruit increased thereafter and reached 66.0% and
74.0%, respectively by the day-4 of storage. Fully matured
fruit under ambient room temperatures showed 15.20% decay
during one day after harvest and 55.60% decay by the second
day of storage which sharply increased over time and reached
up to 99.40% during the day 4. Decay incidence was found
higher at fully ripe fruits than three-quarter ripe fruits
(Nunes and Morais, 2002).