The Tropical Fruit Forum

We know about hardy citrus on trifoliate and Flying Dragon trifoliate rootstock, but how much do we know about hardy citrus on other trifoliate hybrid rootstocks?

How do you think hardy citrus would do on Tai-tri or US 852 (Changsha x trifoliate) ?

Jamaican Ugli fruit small seedlings available, grown from seed

can't ship to citrus states or Europe
free, but you pay for shipping


seedlings are not in the best shape but should survive if you give them proper care

This topic came up in another thread, and I'd like to discuss how to use Yuzu.
First I want to say Yuzu is a wonderful unique citrus, with a unique flavor. But those who do not know how to properly use Yuzu may not be able to appreciate it.

I never found a good use for yuzu & cut both my trees down.

And you never bothered to do any research to see how Yuzu fruit are used?

Sure I did, and still couldn't find a use for them. I'm not going to float them in the bath & as far as a good tasting citrus, it isn't.

Yuzu is definitely not a fruit for direct out of hand eating.

I slice up a Yuzu, remove all the seeds (there's a lot of them but it's not difficult because the seeds are so big), then chop up the fruits further and cook them into a citrus marmalade sauce to spread over fish. With Yuzu there's no need to remove the rinds, indeed there wouldn't be that much useable part of the fruit left if you did so. The rinds have a lot of flavor, and are a lot more tender, less bitter, and more edible than lemon or orange rinds would be.
This isn't unusual. Sometimes mandarin peels and even orange peels are used in stir fries in Chinese cuisine, mostly to impart flavor but it won't hurt if you eat some of it. However the rinds of Yuzu are much more edible.
Not quite like the kumquats but I would say they are only a little less tender than mandarinquats.
I actually enjoy taking a few table out of the peel of a fresh Yuzu.

Yuzu is most typically used for flavoring. It's really in good in Japanese-style ponzu sauces for dipping.
Typically the entire fruits are crushed, with the juice and essential oils from the rind collected. (It would probably be even better flavor wise to remove the seeds first before crushing but that would add more work)
There's not a huge amount of juice inside a Yuzu, and this is in large part because there are so many large seeds.

Yuzu kosho is great on egg rolls or omelettes. Yuzu is also good in salad dressings.

Also good for soba (buckwheat) noodles or Japanese noodle bowls with fish.

Lemon juice can substitute for Yuzu in most recipes but the flavor is just not the same.

Also there are some great recipes for candied Yuzu peel, which are much like candied citron.
You could even bake these into a cake, and I have a great tasting recipe for Yuzu blueberry muffins.

If you're still not sold on Yuzu, you might see this video for inspiration:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jdUq2AVLEn8

I'm sure Yuzu has (or could have) all sorts of other culinary uses as well.

These are some seedlings I'm growing:
Kaffir lime, Yuzu, Ichangquat, US 852, one of them is a Thomasville Citrangequat and one is an N1tri


These are a Ventura Lemandarin (back) and Dimicelli seedlings that Eyeckr gave me. They're putting on new growth.



They're inside a grow tent.
(I measured the temperature difference and it's 7 degrees (F) warmer inside the enclosure than inside the room it is in)

These are some pictures of a Citrange growing in the Philadelphia area, outside unprotected.
Supposedly this variety is actually a cross between a Mandarin and a Citrange.
It was planted in 2003. It died back one winter a few years ago and has probably since died completely in the severe 2017/2018 winter.



It's semi-evergreen, meaning only maybe 20 percent of the leaves yellow in fall.
There are thorns in there too. Some of the leaves appear to be trifoliate.
The first fruits appeared in 2007, and there were three fruits that year. The next year there were twelve, and thirteen fruits the year after that.



The fruits even get a chance to ripen to nice glossy orange. They contain plenty of seeds.
Unfortunately they taste bitter and sour, not very edible.



This is just a repost of an old thread from another forum:
http://www.philadelphiaspeaks.com/threads/my-citrandarin-tree.7372/#post-121801

I don't know if there's any chance this tree could have been a Dimicelli.
The original post said his tree was a cross between a Mandarin and Citrange.
I have a Dimicelli seedling and from the research I've been able to dig up about it it supposedly came from a cross between Temple orange and poncirus, which was then crossed with a Clementine.

Citrus ichangensis x Poncirus trifoliata (N1tri) seedling



kumquat x C. ichangensis (Ichangquat) seedling



some Yuzu (C. junos) seedlings
Yuzu has a really close genetic relationship with C. ichangensis, it may even be descended from it (possibly as a result of genetric introgression from another C. reticula-like citrus species). Some see Yuzu as a C. ichangensis hybrid (constituting an Ichandarin), although it's certainly not a direct hybrid. Yuzu isn't quite as cold hardy as C. ichangensis, maybe but it is a more vigorous and fast grower and can easily recover from damage. Also the leaves of C. ichangensis smell nothing like Yuzu, although they do share a same distict "deepness". Otherwise the smell of C. ichangensis leaves are very mild (maybe a bit like Kaffir lime leaf) and a bit lemony. The leaves of Yuzu are practically like petitgrain (strong, green, harsh, petitgrain is made from the leaves of bergamot citrus). The fruits of Yuzu are very fragrant though (like a mixture of sour orange, Satsuma mandarin, lemon, and maybe a hint of grapefruit sweetness, and also it is a pungently deep spicy smell).

How much do we know about graft chimeras and hardy citrus?

Graft chimeras are a sort of hybrid, but not a genetic one, between two different species that resulted through grafting, typically from growth offshoot coming out of a graft union area and then separately propagated. The graft chimera is comprised of a mixture of cells between the two citrus types.

There are different types of graft chimeras. The most homogeneous ones, and the ones of most interest are periclinal chimeras, which typically involve a single layer of cells distributed throughout the growth of the plant.

I'm also experimenting with joining together different seedlings together at the earliest stage of their development, so that the seedling sprout consists of a mix of cells from two sources. (This takes some very fine precision and a good eye)

How much hardiness can a cold hardy variety confer to another normal citrus variety when they are part of a chimera together?
Could this be a viable strategy for developing new cold hardy citrus?

From what I've seen, many obscure citrus varieties that are believed to have originated as a graft chimera have not actually been confirmed as being so, so it's not truly known with certainty.
The only way to be sure is if there's obvious phenotypical differences in different parts of the tree, or on different parts of the fruit, but in that case its not a very homogenous chimera, and not a periclinal type of one, which would be expected to give the best hardiness because the cells are more evenly distributed throughout the plant.

Say for instance we had a Satsuma graft chimera together with a Satsuma-trifoliate (citrandarin) hybrid.
The Satsuma-trifoliate hybrid within the chimera system could be a triploid with only one of its three sets of chromosomes coming from trifoliate.*
That could potentially make the resulting chimera nearly indistinguishable from normal Satsuma.


* (This could come about through hybridizing a tetraploid Satsuma with a normal diploid trifoliate, or the pollen may have been unreduced coming from the Satsuma, or the female parent being used could have been a "seedless" triploid, and so any rare seeds that did manage to form would be much more likely to have originated from an unreduced female gamete, since triploid cells that undergo meiosis have a fairly high chance of turning out aneuploid and won't develop. Also, you have to have a non-nucellar citrus variety for the triploid to turn out seedless, otherwise the seeds are still going to form from nucellar tissue even though the zygote failed to develop.)


Prague Citsuma is believed to be a graft hybrid, but it has not yet been positively confirmed with certainty. (A few basic tests were done but were inconclusive)

Fresh seeds available, several different varieties, only available for the next 5 days
$5.50 for >5 seeds, probably more

White grapefruit (probably Duncan or Marsh) - gold standard of grapefruit flavor
Melogold
Ugli Fruit
Satsuma mandarin (only 3 seeds)
Yuzu (only 3 seeds)
Kaffir lime (not a true a lime, cold hardier than regular limes, down to zone 9)

For best chances of germination and fastest germination time, begin sprouting as soon as you receive them
You are most likely to have 100% germination rate with these (although the Yuzu has been in the refrigerator for over 3 weeks now, which might affect chances of germination).

Also willing to trade, if you have any super cold hardy variety seeds (or will have them in the future)

Some of you may have seen my thread "Karp's Sweet and other Edible Quinces for Eating Raw"

available: 2 free seeds 

Crimea or Kuganskaya variety. These quince are possible to eat raw, very little or almost no astringency. The fruits are very tart and kind of acidic though.
Quince is kind of an obscure fruit species now. These particular cultivar varieties are even rarer.

You'll probably need to grow the seedlings and then later graft them onto rootstock, if you don't want to be waiting around forever to get fruit.

This post is about how to breed seedless bananas for temperate climates, a rough outline idea.

Select a cold-hardy banana (such as Musa basjoo) and then select another "edible" (good tasting, but seeded) banana which is very early ripening (perhaps Helen's hybrid).

Treat the apical bud with either Colchicine or Oryzalin to double to chromosome number, obtaining a tetraploid.


"Tetraploid plants were induced successfully from diploid bananas Musa acuminata ‘Kluai Leb Mu Nang’ and ‘Kluai Sa’ (2n = 2x = 22) with in vitro oryzalin treatment. Calluses from in vitro-grown shoot tips of both cultivars were treated with oryzalin at concentrations of 1.5 or 3 mg l−1 for 24, 48 and 72 h, respectively. The oryzalin treatments produced tetraploids at a frequency of 15.6% in ‘Kluai Leb Mu Nang’ and 16.7% in ‘Kluai Sa’ as detected by flow cytometry. Chromosome counting showed that the tetraploid plant chromosome number was (2n = 4x = 44). The selected tetraploid plants were transplanted in the field and variations in the morphological characteristic of leaf shape and fruit bunch compared to normal diploid plants were found under the same growing condition even after 3 years of cultivation."

In vitro induction of tetraploid plants from callus cultures of diploid bananas (Musa acuminata , AA group), Kluai Leb Mu Nang, Kluai Sa


Here's another relevant article as well: http://hortsci.ashspublications.org/content/43/7/2248.full


When a normal diploid is bred with a tetraploid, the result is a seedless triploid variety.


"Most bananas purchased at your local supermarket came from sterile triploid hybrids."
https://www2.palomar.edu/users/warmstrong/hybrids1.htm

This is based on a previous thread, and I thought to make a new thread on the topic, sharing some of my knowledge and thoughts.

Some of you living in zone 8 may be wondering if it's possible to grow an orange tree outside, or whether there's any kind of orange tree hardy down to zone 8a.

Well first, let me explain something. The most common citrus that people normally want to grow, oranges, regular lemons and limes, these are some of the least cold hardy citrus varieties. It's no wonder then that there's a common perception that citrus doesn't grow in zone 8, because normally when people have tried growing citrus, these are the types they have tried.

Now, before I explain further, I would like to share an optimistic story with you.

________________________________________________________________

North Waco family's orange tree a miracle on 15th Street
by J.B. Smith, January 2013



A tree that Juana Delgado grew from the seed of a grocery store orange has become a miracle on 15th Street.

This month, Delgado’s family has harvested an estimated 600 oranges from the tree she planted 15 years ago when she moved into the Habitat for Humanity home near North 15th Street and Colcord Avenue.

In recent weeks, the family made big jugs of orange juice, shared fruit with passing vagrants and sent their children door-to-door to give away large bags of juicy oranges.

The tree has defied the conventional wisdom that oranges can't survive the Central Texas winter, when temperatures usually dip into the low 20s.

But the tree has soldiered on, even through a January 2010 cold snap when temperatures plummeted to 8 degrees.
"Many people said it’s not possible," Delgado said in Spanish. "I say, 'Come look. It's possible.'"
Mark Barnett, a McLennan County master gardener and a landscaper by trade, said he has seen many people try to grow citrus trees they bought from big box stores, but the trees usually freeze and die.

"It's very unusual for it to have survived that long without protection," he said. "We've had some extremely cold winters that should have killed it."

Delgado started the orange tree in a pot using a seed from an orange she bought at an H-E-B supermarket. Most table oranges are improved hybrid varieties and tend not to reproduce faithfully by seed, Barnett said.

But Delgado's oranges turned out sweet and flavorful. Delgado has been harvesting a few oranges a year during the last decade but got her first big harvest two winters ago: A basket and a box full. In the 2011 drought, she kept the tree alive by watering it but ended up with only three oranges that season.
This year, she hit the jackpot. Her children and grandchildren climbed ladders to pick the fruit and filled six boxes with about 100 oranges each.

https://www.wacotrib.com/news/north-waco-family-s-orange-tree-a-miracle-on-th/article_3928e5be-b811-52ef-8dee-465b5788e6ae.html

________________________________________________________________

Waco, Texas, is in zone 8a, and is just a little south of Dallas. Although in recent years the 8b zone has been moving north, first the southern half of Waco was reclassified into zone 8b, and now on the latest maps zone 8b has engulfed the entire city.

I've also speculated in another thread that citrus grown from seed may have more cold hardiness in zone 8 than the usual citrus on rootstock. (This doesn't necessarily apply in zone 7 though)

So now you know there's some hope an orange tree may be able to survive in zone 8. But don't get your hopes up because this is zone 8 in the American South and Texas. All the heat during the growing season (mostly because the growing season is longer) helps the citrus put on a lot of growth and better recover from the Winter. And there may be the odd year once in a while, with an exceptionally cold Winter, where your tree is going to killed to the ground. That's the type of climate that exists in the Southeast and Gulf Coast.

But now going back to the original topic. Are there any type of Oranges that are more hardy? Or are there any orange-like citrus that are more hardy?

The only actual orange that I'm aware of that has a good chance of surviving in zone 8a is Chinotto orange. It's actually more of a sour orange, the type good for making marmalade. You can eat it, but it's not as good eating quality as a regular orange.

Then there is Bloomsweet grapefruit. It's not really a "real" grapefruit. In form and flavor it's more like something halfway between an orange and grapefruit. The eating quality isn't bad but the eating quality isn't really quite as good as the oranges or grapefruits you can find in a supermarket, and it is full of seeds. (It is believed Bloomsweet may have come from a variety in Japan named "kinkoji", and a genetic analysis has shown it to be half-sibling to the popular variety Satsuma)

Tangelos have more cold hardiness than oranges. I'm not saying a tangelo is going to grow well in zone 8a, but it's probably going to have a much better chance than orange. Minneola tangelo has great flavor, but Orlando tangelo is known to have slightly better cold hardiness than Minneola.
In general, mandarins (sometimes called "mandarin orange") are more cold hardy than oranges. Not incredibly cold hardy, but mandarins can be commercially grown on the border between zone 9a/8b.

If you're interested in juicing, FF-6-15-150 is a newer one that came out of a USDA breeding program in Florida, and is rated to be as hardy as the cold hardiest commercial mandarin varieties. It was in large part bred from Orlando tangelo, is said to have great flavor, though seedy and on the small side for an orange. But it's not commonly available to the public and may be difficult to get your hands on.

Calamondin is believed to have originated from hybridization between kumquat and orange. It has more cold hardiness than orange, can grow in zone 8b, and has a chance of growing in zone 8a (maybe not as well). Mandarinquat is similar, it's a hybrid between kumquat and mandarin, and has slightly more cold hardiness than calamondin. The inside flesh of a mandarinquat is better than a kumquat, but although it can be eaten like a kumquat, the skin is a little bit tougher and not as good. And of course this section wouldn't be complete without making quick mention to Nippon Orangequat (a hybrid between kumquat and Satsuma mandarin). It has the best chance of doing well in zone 8.

Changsha mandarin and Citrange (a cross between Orange and bitter Trifoliate Orange) are two more pretty cold hardy ones that are distantly orange-like, sort of, if you're willing to drastically lower your expectations of fruit quality and flavor.

There are many other citrus varieties that have more cold hardiness but none of them are really "orange-like", so we won't really go into that discussion here.

I have theory. I don't have any evidence for it, but let me share the reasoning for it.

Among different citrus varieties there are some which produce a higher percentage of nucellar seeds than others. Some citrus species produce entirely zygotic seed, while other varieties produce almost entirely nucellar seed, and there are several varieties with percentages in between. If the seed is nucellar, it will be a genetic clone of its parent. Not really a good thing if you're trying to hybridize new citrus varieties, but a good thing for those growing rootstock from seed, where uniformity is important.

The reason, it is believed, some citrus varieties form nucellar seed is that the sexual gamete cells inside the seed are not vigorous enough and can't compete with the nucellar cells.

The original origin citrus species are, almost entirely without exception, all zygotic. But when different citrus species are hybridized the percentages of nucellar seed shoot up. This could be because the hybridization between different species (which are not entirely compatible) results in a weaker gamete (megagametophyte), and so the nucellar lining takes over.

My theory is that if a hybrid citrus flower is pollinated with pollen from one of the original two species from which the hybrid originated from, the percentage of nucellar seed is likely to be lower. This would be because, the genetic composition of the megagametophyte would be less heterogenous, and thus presumably have more vigor.

So, for example, if Yuzu were pollinated by C. ichangensis, there might be some zygotic seeds form in the Yuzu fruit.

If this theory is true, this may confer some advantage to hybridizing new citrus varieties, since normally trying to hybridize a variety that is highly nucellar and using it as the female parent presents some pragmatic challenges.