The Tropical Fruit Forum

Mikkel, the seeds that I planted unfortunately rotted. I also sent some seeds to one man, and he had success with germination.

For me, a Poncirus fruit with a diameter of 5-6 cm is big.

I've made this photo recently, for comparison. The bigger fruit comes from a standard PT and is 5 cm in diameter. The smaller ones come from a Flying dragon plant and are 3-4 cm in diameter. I've also seen standard PT plants with such small fruits. So there are definitely differences in fruit size depending on the particular plant/cultivar.

I can confirm that N1tri has good frost hardiness.
Last year I planted it inground to see what happens. For the winter covered it with white agrotextile. Winter proved hard, with a minimum of -21 C.


After the winter N1tri was severely damaged but some wood survived. I dug it out and planted again to a pot.


It has recovered fast and is in good condition now. Bark crack is still visible, but healing.

I have fresh trifoliate orange seeds to share. It is Flying dragon variety.
If you're interested, PM me.

Hi. I'd like to share my experiences on crossing kumquat with trifoliate orange.

I've heard many times that it's a really difficult cross to make, but I still wanted to try. So last year I've been making some pollinations.

Nagami kumquat x Flying dragon Poncirus
I used two different Nagami cultivars as the mother plants. Pollinated flowers set fruit easily, and seed set proved not bad. The seedlings germinated quickly, but soon some of them refused growing. Still, the rest is growing fine up till now and I hope they will stay like that.


For comparison - standard Poncirus seedling on the left, Nagami x Poncirus on the right:


Reale mandarinquat x Flying dragon Poncirus
In this cross, fruit and seed set were also not bad, but most of the seedlings proved weak and generally aberrant. Some had strange, narrow leaves, and some were even monofoliate. Maybe these abnormalities are connected with the fact that Reale is triploid. Still, I think that with a bit of luck this cross is worth a try.


So to sum up, I think that crossing kumquat with the trifoliate orange is not such a bad idea. There's a good chance of getting a really cold hardy citrus with quite edible fruits.

What do you think? Have you tried making similar crosses? If yes, have you met any obstacles?

He is risen, indeed! Alleluia!
Happy Easter to all!

That's a great piece of work, Sylvain! There's a lot of valuable information on that forum.

Ilya11, thanks. Triploid hybrid sounds interesting, as I understand in this case 2/3 of its genes would come from Reale and only 1/3 from trifoliata. This should give a bit better fruit (less sticky gum etc.) in comparison with a diploid cross being 50% trifoliata.

Sylvain, it's good to know the right name. Thanks for providing it.

I just found it on the internet - a red-fruited mutation of Rangpur lime. Called Limão cravo sanguíneo in Brazil, where it apparently comes from. Unfortunately, it seems very rare.
I imagine it makes a great potted plant. Rangpurs are one of the best citrus to grow in pots.

http://ciprest.blogspot.com/2017/04/limao-cravo-sanguineo-citrus-limonia.html

Here are better pictures of one leaf, for the size.

Ynk88, your seedling has unique shaped leaves. I think it's not a pure pummelo, but some sort of pummelo hybrid. Some pummelo hybrids still have heart-shaped petioles.

This is one of my pummelo x Ponderosa lemon hybrid seedlings. The petioles aren't as big as these on your plant, but some of them overlap the leaf in a similar way.


And this one has elongated leaves, quite similar to yours, but petioles are smaller and rounded.


If yet another combination had happened, a seedling from this cross could have both overlapping petioles and elongated leaves. Then, I think it would be quite similar to yours.
I'm not saying your seedling is exactly a pummelo x Ponderosa, but who knows.

@edit: changed hosting. Photobucket doesn't work properly.

Thanks Ynk88. I hope they all will grow well.

Ynk88, congrats on finding these seeds

This year I've also found my first seed in a Persian lime (a triploid too). The seed was small but luckily sprouted and gave this one seedling. It's about 1 month old now. I hope it will get more vigorous soon.

I wish I could send budwood to USA. Susanne, there are no fruit on my Trabut this year, maybe in the next year there will be some. I'll let you know when I have seeds.