The Tropical Fruit Forum
Citrus => Cold Hardy Citrus => Topic started by: lebmung on March 16, 2019, 06:08:26 PM
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Anyone growing Citrus tachibana?
According to Swingle it is strongly resistant to frost and snow.
Unfit for eating?
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It's probably close to Changsha mandarin in terms of edibility, though a bit more sour.
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It's probably close to Changsha mandarin in terms of edibility, though a bit more sour.
"Changsha produces heavy crops of small, puffy, and seedy fruit. However, the fruit is very sweet and juicy."
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This is just from memory, the impression I got from reading about it in some research, it's a very close relative of C. reticula (mandarin) but more like a wild mandarin cousin. The flavor is probably a bit more bland, less sweet, and definitely inferior to a normal mandarin, but not distasteful.
C. tachibana has apparently been used in the past to breed several other native Japanese citrus varieties. It is the only citrus species believed to have been native to the islands of Japan.
It has moderate fairly good tolerance and apparently is quite accustomed to the growing conditions in Japan. (Which probably means its native climate is zone 9 but it can also survive zone 8, possibly with a bit of difficulty further north.
It's probably adapted to a somewhat cooler maritime climate than typical citrus.
You can take that for whatever it's worth. (Just some rough information in case you cannot find a better accurate source)
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Yes I read the description. It's a wild mandarin native to Japan. The use it decoratively at shrines and imperial buildings.
I am more interested if someone ever tasted one.
It's used as a rootstock in Japan for satsuma mandarin along with Yuzu. Maybe try to adapt it to zone 8.
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This is just from memory, the impression I got from reading about it in some research
I know you try to find new hybrids, Shekwasha Citrus depressa, could be candidate. Another wild mandarin native to Japan and Taiwan. Hard to find much information about it's hardiness, but I suspect less hardy than tachibana. Fruits are very sour, used as a lime substitute and medicine.
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> "Changsha produces heavy crops of small, puffy, and seedy fruit. However, the fruit is very sweet and juicy."
Mines are big and not very seedy. They are not puffy but easy to peel. The rest is as you say: heavy crops, sweet and juicy but it is a good mandarine, not a very good mandarine.
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> "Changsha produces heavy crops of small, puffy, and seedy fruit. However, the fruit is very sweet and juicy."
Mines are big and not very seedy. They are not puffy but easy to peel. The rest is as you say: heavy crops, sweet and juicy but it is a good mandarine, not a very good mandarine.
Two years ago at the Southeastern Citrus Meeting I tasted the irradiated nearly seedless Changsha from Dr. Hanna. It was very bland, which others had also described for the standard Changsha. The fruit that got the award for Best in Show was also a Changsha, and it tasted very good. It was fairly seedy. There is a selection called Honey Changsha.
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How cold hardy is Changsha?
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How cold hardy is Changsha?
Supposedly maybe 10 degrees F, but probably more like 11.
Keep in mind that's that absolute minimum it is capable of surviving, it may not do well down to that temperature. In the South it will be able to recover better than somewhere further North.
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How cold hardy is Changsha?
Supposedly maybe 10 degrees F, but probably more like 11.
Keep in mind that's that absolute minimum it is capable of surviving, it may not do well down to that temperature. In the South it will be able to recover better than somewhere further North.
I guess it would survive in an unheated green house with good ventilation and a heat sink.
What about Citrus depressa? Not much information about its cold hardiness, native in southern japan and mountainous area in Taiwan. This is very sour, but good to burn fat ;D
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What about Citrus depressa? Not much information about its cold hardiness, native in southern japan and mountainous area in Taiwan.
A genetic study in Japan showed a close affinity between C. depressa (Shikuwasa) and C. tachibana, but it was not a direct parent-offspring relationship. Suffice to say they are probably related, and do not simply constitute separate species. C. depressa also showed a smaller degree of Yuzu or C. ichangensis ancestry.
It's really difficult to say exactly how these varieties might have originally came about.
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I have citrus depressa (Shekwasha), citrus amblycarpa (Nasnaran) and changsha ("Honey" variety). My Shekwasha has survived every cold event that has come my way for the past 15 years which includes out surviving all my kumquats/kumquat hybrids, tiawanica, satsumas and more. We have gotten as low as 4-5 degrees F, maybe slightly lower. It has struggled the last couple of years and now is very small but it is still hanging in there. I grafted it on flying dragon about 4 feet up. If it were not grafted high up on flying dragon I don't think it would have survived all these years.
My ungrafted changsha died to the ground the year we hit 4-5F and barely came back from the roots that summer. Luckily I had enough material to graft it onto a trifoliate rootstock that I had growing right next to it and it survives today. The little sprout from the roots eventually died off.
I had a small Nasnaran graft out but it never got a chance to get established before we got slammed with single degree weather. It would be worth trying out again. I think the fruit taste similar to Tang. I have fruit currently on a potted tree. I can offer some seed or fruit in the for sale section if there is any interest.
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From what I read in Japanese books Citrus depressa is subtropical. It doesn't winter well in Japan where satsumas grow. And it should over winter above freezing. It seems like if below freezing the next year won't produce fruit. The fruit is used same like Sudachi when green. When ripe is sweet. Is interesting that it tolerates high pH, and calcarous soil. Maybe a good candidate in container culture as a rootstock where tap water is used. P. trifoliata on the other hand is sensitive to alkaline soil.
C. tachibana is truly wild and takes cold and snow well. The fruit is bitter, and not eaten in Japan.
I will give a try to test Citrus depressa.
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Pretty sure none of these are going to be hardier than Yuzu, so they're not going to survive in zone 7.
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I have a grafted yuzu it survived well over this winter. The others will be in an unheated greenhouse. I also have a kereji that is doing well. The winters here are very cold only for a couple of weeks that can go down to -11 to -15C in January that is the only critical period. Most of the time during the hard freezing it's a lot of snow like 20-30cm that keeps all the plants beneath. Very sunny winters so only the night is cold. Besides that spring starts very early. Now it's already 23C during the day.
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Is your Keraji growing outside unprotected?
You said you are in Bucharest, are you in the middle of a city or further out with open yard space?
How many years has it survived?
Your Yuzu was also unprotected in any way?
Is it near the wall of a home?
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I am right in the center of the city, surrounded by low rise concrete houses, facing south.
So I guess it's a microclimate and it could be zone 8a or b.
I didn't dare to test the trees as it's not easy to get another ones.
So I can tell you -4C was all I tested so far for Yuzu and satsuma. They are grafted.
Kereji I just got it this year. I will wait to make fruits and graft few trees for experiment.
I am not so interested to grow them in open field, my trials are to see how to grow them in a poly tunnel using passive energy methods becasue there I could control the temperature, say a very cold spike for few days.
I will try to get depressa and maybe tachibana. There are also many japanese citruses not available outside japan that survive cold and are cold hardy, but most of them are recent research.
A deciduous citrus with good fruit would be the best.
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Yuzu has many different clones with a large variation as to winter hardiness.
Highly grafted Keraji is more resistant than satsumas and average Yuzu; in my garden it was not damaged during two seasons with episodes of ~10 days without soil defrost and night temperatures of -9°C.
During them one of my Yuzus was defoliated, another got severe frostbites.
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Highly grafted Keraji is more resistant than satsumas and average Yuzu
Why should it be grafted 50 cm above? Kereji is more sensitive to phytophthora, do you think it attacks when it rains and water splashes to bud union?
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High grafting on poncirus rootstock improves greatly cold hardiness.
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High grafting on poncirus rootstock improves greatly cold hardiness.
I was wondering what is the reason of this.
Closer to ground is warmer than 1 m high.
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Not during the winter atmospheric inversion.
Frostbites occur usually in the lower part of the trunk.
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This is especially noticeable when there is snow on the ground. The snow acts as an insulating barrier, not allowing warmth to radiate up from the soil. This creates a layer of super chilled air directly above the snow as there is little mixing of air layers close to ground. I have seen as much as 5 degrees Celsius colder on top of the snow, in contrast to 2 meters above the snow.
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I am not convinced by this reasoning. At least not in my climate, continental dry.
It makes sense if there is snow. Without notuch here. I read the temperature of the soil it's always warmer.
The low freezing by temperatures occur when it's clear sky. So that means during the day it's sunny and during the night is the coldest. But the sun is warmingup the soil. Here the cold comes as an air mass from siberia, without the wind to bring it it would not be so cold.
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Inversion should be rather common in Bucharest that is situated not far from Carpathian mountains.
Other nearby European cities like Budapest, Bratislava, Sophia, Vienna, Belgrade have it quite often.
https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Inversion_(meteorology) (https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Inversion_(meteorology))
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Inversion rarely occurs here during the winter. Sunny but cold winters. Very different from Budapest where is humid and foggy.
In the Carpathins it does occur often because air gets trapped in valleys and Transylvania.
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Just try to measure the temperature at the ground and at two meters high during winter anticyclone , you will see that is quite common.
Inversion in București (https://www.researchgate.net/publication/299628903_The_thermal_inversion_phenomena_on_ground_level_and_in_the_free_atmosphere_in_the_first_3000_m_above_Moldova_Romania/download)
At my place, far from the mountains, the temperatures at lower part of my property could be 3°C lower than at the highest point with 5 m of altitude difference.
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I only measured the soil temperature and it's always higher than air temperature.
The article is about another region. Yes over there it happens all the time. But here in Bucurest it occurs rarely.
It's in the plain and strong cold wind comes from East or warm wind from south. Near the mountains and inside the plains it can be like -15 on top of the mountain 2500m and down in valleys and depressions -25. But not here only rarely , not much fog either. We don't have the oceanic influence like in France.
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The article is about another region. Yes over there it happens all the time. But here in Bucurest it occurs rarely.
The article describes winter inversion at Aurel-Vlaicu International airport (București Băneasa) situated 7 km from downtown Bucharest.
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High grafting on trifoliate is advised by J. Stewart Nagle in Citrus for the Gulf Coast. It is said to reinforce winter dormancy of the entire plant.
(https://images90.fotosik.pl/145/5168f51b9c56acc8.jpg) (https://www.fotosik.pl/zdjecie/5168f51b9c56acc8)
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The article is about another region. Yes over there it happens all the time. But here in Bucurest it occurs rarely.
The article describes winter inversion at Aurel-Vlaicu International airport (București Băneasa) situated 7 km from downtown Bucharest.
The study uses data among other stations to make a model for Moldova where indeed this happens often.
It's so much as in the morth. Sometimes it happens then the newspapers star to write. Like it happens with freezing rain with was an vent not seen for many years.
"The low altitude respectively 91 m Bucharest and 43 m to Odessa, and the high frequency of warm and moist advection (Lolis et al 2012) results in a small thickness of inversion layers."
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High grafting on trifoliate is advised by J. Stewart Nagle in Citrus for the Gulf Coast. It is said to reinforce winter dormancy of the entire plant.
This makes sense more then inversion.
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One does not exclude another, increased dormancy prevents frostbites that usually occur in a lower part of the trunk due to the reversed temperature gradient.
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Lebmung, it seems you don't know what is "inversion" nor "infrared radiation". You are always speaking of cold winds but inversion occurs only when there is no wind but clear sky. There are two ways to get colds. You speak of one way and Ilya speaks of the other.
The best would be to read few things about it.
> The soil is hotter than the air
yes, this is usually true. The frost damages are very rare in the first 5 cm (2inc). But when in the 'inversion conditions' the temperature at 10 cm are much lower than at 1 meter.
This effect is often called inverse greenhouse effect.
Cold continental climate is the perfect place for inversion conditions. Romania cannot be an exception...
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Ok so how many degrees difference are we talking about between temperature at 5cm and 1m high?
In this case would be easier to just warp the trunk with coconut blanket.
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Lebmung,
In any case it is a good idea to protect the trunk if high crafted on PT. Inversion is most likely linked to clear and sunny weather at day. The sun warms up the trunk which often results in severe cracks in the bark. Theses cracks often kill a tree. I had cracks on a high crafted Citrumelo and only PT trunk was affected. Citrumelo itself was not harmed at all. All cracks appeared on sun exposed parts. I was lucky my tree did not die but recovered quite well.
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Lebmung,
In any case it is a good idea to protect the trunk if high crafted on PT. Inversion is most likely linked to clear and sunny weather at day. The sun warms up the trunk which often results in severe cracks in the bark. Theses cracks often kill a tree. I had cracks on a high crafted Citrumelo and only PT trunk was affected. Citrumelo itself was not harmed at all. All cracks appeared on sun exposed parts. I was lucky my tree did not die but recovered quite well.
There is more than hundred years old tradition in my country to paint trunks of apple trees, plum trees etc. in white with lime to avoid cracking of bark because of different temperatures during early spring days and nights. (To reflect the sunlight)
(https://i.postimg.cc/rDBpPQQK/8.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/rDBpPQQK)
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It has been discussed on the old forum ( http://citrusgrowersstatic.chez.com (http://citrusgrowersstatic.chez.com)), using latex paint, it is said to work well.
I wanted to try but didn't find any latex paint in France!
What is traditionally used is chalk paint but we cannot use it for citrus because it increases the pH of the soil.
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Traditinaly we use extinguished lime,
In shops here we can buy "LacBalsam® Baumstamm-Schutzfarbe weiß" special flexible white painting
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Etisso-LacBalsam-White-Trunk-Protection/dp/B076KPGSN4 (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Etisso-LacBalsam-White-Trunk-Protection/dp/B076KPGSN4)
Btw.:
Latex paints are realy common here in shops, strange that you cannot find any in France,
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Tollens sells Acrylic water based paints. Latex paint is often labeled "Acrylic Latex". I'm not positive it's the same, but it might be worth checking out.
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Now I use reflecting foil. works well and protects the trunk from cold radiation aswell.
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Lebmung,
In any case it is a good idea to protect the trunk if high crafted on PT. Inversion is most likely linked to clear and sunny weather at day. The sun warms up the trunk which often results in severe cracks in the bark. Theses cracks often kill a tree. I had cracks on a high crafted Citrumelo and only PT trunk was affected. Citrumelo itself was not harmed at all. All cracks appeared on sun exposed parts. I was lucky my tree did not die but recovered quite well.
This is about another issue. We were talking about inversion.
About solar radiation, it's true what you say. But I would use a thick breathable coconut trunk protection.
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Thank you Radoslav and kumin. I was looking for latex paint but in France it refers only to true latex.
As you made me understand that latex also means acrylic it has been very easy to find. :)
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> Ok so how many degrees difference are we talking about between temperature at 5cm and 1m high?
about 3°C (~6°F) but in a very flat place or a bottom of valley it can be more.
You see, it cannot be neglected.
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Yes in valleys and open field. But probably not in cities.
I didn't think about this before to be such a difference, next water I will make some tests with a temperature logger.
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Streets in many urban environments are analogs of mountain valleys and urban inversion is aggravated by atmospheric pollution.
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Thank you Radoslav and kumin. I was looking for latex paint but in France it refers only to true latex.
As you made me understand that latex also means acrylic it has been very easy to find. :)
No, there are
Acrilic colours based on Acrylic resin
Latex colours based on polyvinyl acetate
Acrilic Latex colours mix ?