I'm totally new to citrus growing and have a couple of questions related to this post. First, I just put my grafted Valencia and California oranges, lime and mandarin in the ground a few months ago. At the time the Valencia was COVERED in blooms, but it's a very small tree, rounded but only a couple of feet tall so I (thanks to advice I got here) didn't let it hold any fruit. One fruit did get to golf ball size before I noticed it and pulled it off, and that was only a month ago. All of the trees suffered some unfortunate and unavoidable drought stress for several weeks, lost some new growth and just looked generally under the weather, but for the last month they've been getting regular water and tlc and are looking good. In fact, that little Valencia is flushing like crazy and, I just noticed today, flower buds. Then I checked the others - flower buds on the mandarin and the lime.
Questions - 1) I see now is the normal time for flowers on citrus, ok, but then why did the Valencia just finish flowering and trying to fruit a few months ago? Shouldn't there be some down time? 2) I suppose the Valencia is still too small to hold fruit, but what about the others, which are all over four feet tall? Let them hold one? Or should I make myself be patient and skip this year?
Thanks in advance for your help!