Post by alexintx on Nov 20, 2018 18:28:03 GMT -5
Does anyone else have any citrus? I don’t have much of a collection, but I’ve got some young guys being propagated — some grapefruit seedlings, some tangerine cuttings, some Meyer lemon cuttings, and some “Flying Dragon” seeds. But I love citrus — the fruits, the trees, the flowers, everything about them. They’re wonderful plants.
Although I’m over 200 miles north of the commercial citrus industry here, that by no means means that you can’t grow them here. Just within a mile of my house, I know of at least one grapefruit, two mandarins, and a tangerine in the ground. And that’s just what you can see from the road. They’re all loaded with fruit. We are tricky in that many times, the winter is too cold for a young tree to make it. Established trees seem to do well — there’s plenty of them around here. I’ve even heard of one person who supposedly has a lime in ground somewhere around here.
I know my little grapefruit seedlings will take forever to fruit, but that’s more of an experiment than anything else. If I actually wanted a fruiting tree in a reasonable timespan, it’s not like there’s a shortage of places that sell citrus here. I think at work we sell 5 gallon citrus (Meyer lemons, satsumas, oranges, grapefruits) for $35 or so, and that’s not counting my employee discount.
I mostly want to see what sorts of trees these little grapefruit will become. To that end, I’ve already let them take the first two freezes of the year, in small pots, on a deck 15’+ above the ground. It was at least 30°, maybe colder, but they took it like champs.
Here they are today — each pot came from one seed. You can see how one of them had multiple successful seedlings. They probably need to be fertilized again and maybe even up-potted, but I’ve been holding off while it’s cold.
Although I’m over 200 miles north of the commercial citrus industry here, that by no means means that you can’t grow them here. Just within a mile of my house, I know of at least one grapefruit, two mandarins, and a tangerine in the ground. And that’s just what you can see from the road. They’re all loaded with fruit. We are tricky in that many times, the winter is too cold for a young tree to make it. Established trees seem to do well — there’s plenty of them around here. I’ve even heard of one person who supposedly has a lime in ground somewhere around here.
I know my little grapefruit seedlings will take forever to fruit, but that’s more of an experiment than anything else. If I actually wanted a fruiting tree in a reasonable timespan, it’s not like there’s a shortage of places that sell citrus here. I think at work we sell 5 gallon citrus (Meyer lemons, satsumas, oranges, grapefruits) for $35 or so, and that’s not counting my employee discount.
I mostly want to see what sorts of trees these little grapefruit will become. To that end, I’ve already let them take the first two freezes of the year, in small pots, on a deck 15’+ above the ground. It was at least 30°, maybe colder, but they took it like champs.
Here they are today — each pot came from one seed. You can see how one of them had multiple successful seedlings. They probably need to be fertilized again and maybe even up-potted, but I’ve been holding off while it’s cold.
I know it's completely the wrong time of year, but I'm tempted to pick up one of the little 1 gallon "Flying Dragons" at work and asking my neighbor for some wood off of their grapefruit tree. If I was successful, it'd get me a nice little tree for like $5 or so that would actually fruit soon-ish. I have growlights and a place to keep the graft warm over winter, but I have very, very little experience with grafting...
For the cuttings, I did what I'd do for any other cutting -- take a few nodes, strip off the bottom leaves, cut the top leaves in half, dip in rooting hormone, and stick in moist 50% perlite, 50% potting soil under lights. Although it's been a couple weeks, the citrus cuttings all look good -- a few lost some leaves, but most look identical to when I took them. There's been no mold or anything. I hope they take! I know the tangerine I got cuttings of does well on it's own roots -- the tree grew from seed and has never been grafted. And it gets decent fruit...
I'd love to hear about other people's citrus!