The Tropical Fruit Forum
Citrus => Cold Hardy Citrus => Topic started by: Citradia on June 19, 2017, 08:52:50 PM
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I'm sure this question has been aswered already, but I missed it: I have severe freeze damage and lost upper half of trees. New growth coming out on branches that survived two, three, four feet from ground. Vigorous sprouts coming up from base and trunk of tree. Do I remove the sprouts that are trying to form new multiple trunks to encourage growth forming higher up, or leave the trunk/base sprouts to help build trunk caliper, supply glucose to root system, and help shade trunk and protect from sunburn?
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P.S. These are trifoliate hybrids and Ichang lemons. Can I root cuttings from these water sprouts?
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Did I "stump" everyone with these questions? Ha-ha! The sound of crickets has been getting loud here on this one.
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Are these seedling trees, or grafted?
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Seedlings. Actually, they are all now putting out shoots of growth higher up the trees now, except the Thomasville; it's the slowest thing to wake up in spring that I've ever seen. It just has a few sprouts coming out low on trunk with some higher trunk and branches still green with some of last year's green leaves still attached.
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Citradia, a good rule of thumb is--------The more hardy a citrus tree is the slower it is to leaf out in the spring.
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Yes, so, do I remove the trunk sprouts to force more vigorous growth higher up, or leave the low sprouts?
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I would remove some or all of the water sprouts to encourage growth from the older surviving parts of the tree. The goal would be to try concentrate on adding onto older woody growth to hopefully gain some more cold tolerance. It might be worth a shot to try rooting the water sprouts.
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Thanks eyecker. That's what I figured. I've already root toned some of the citrumelo sprouts.