Show Posts

This section allows you to view all posts made by this member. Note that you can only see posts made in areas you currently have access to.


Messages - Citradia

Pages: [1] 2 3 ... 39
1
Cold Hardy Citrus / Re: Ways to protect your citrus trees in ground
« on: October 25, 2023, 09:18:53 PM »
Good luck finding incandescent Christmas lights. All the lights for sale now are led and don’t put out heat. I wouldn’t put flammable materials too close to the incandescent lights. Forget the heat lamp bulbs that go in reptile aquarium; they shatter when outside in a cold frame, I think due to humidity freezing and then rapidly heating up of the glass.

2
Cold Hardy Citrus / Re: Ways to protect your citrus trees in ground
« on: October 21, 2023, 07:01:36 AM »
I’ve tried putting wire cage around trees and fill it with leaves from yard. I get to low single digits and sometimes zero or below rarely. It didn’t matter; they died to the ground. The only way I can prevent severe damage is sturdy wood cold frame or pvc pipe dome cover in 4 mil plastic sheeting to the ground with edges weighted down with rocks, water barrels inside, and small 250 watt space heater inside on a thermo cube to turn it on and off. Does not matter if it’s a satsuma or citrange, if no space heater, it dies or so severely damaged it may as well be gone. Last year, I went to two degrees F with 60 mph winds and no power for two hours, and lost 10 year old Rio red and about 10 other trees, but Kimbrough and Owari only partially damaged and a citradia next to house with plastic over pvc frame and 32 gallon water barrel was undamaged. Citradia trees in my orchard with plastic only or unprotected died completely. I bought small kerosene heaters as a back up for when power goes out and I can’t get generator started for this winter.

3
Cold Hardy Citrus / Re: Citrus damage after freeze
« on: March 08, 2023, 07:34:44 AM »
Thanks, tedburn. I’m planning on putting my Prague on poncirus and citrumelo on poncirus that are currently in pots in ground in cold frames to test them out for next winter. I’m scaling back though. I’ve had too much to protect. Too much work for no reward. It also looks bad having tent city in the yard seven months out of the year.

4
Cold Hardy Citrus / Re: Citrus damage after freeze
« on: March 07, 2023, 09:51:06 PM »
I’m so discouraged after the hard December freeze, I am close to quitting citrus altogether. I lost or suffered severe damage to everything except poncirus. My power was out for two hours during a 2 degree freeze with a high of 8 degrees and below freezing for about five days. That means my heaters were off in cold frames and we couldn’t get generator to start to get heaters back on. Then, I figured out I had used too long of an extension cord to supply power to my heaters in the valley orchard, so basically those citrus got no power or heat all winter until after the week of hard freeze, so they’re all dead except the side of the yuzu that was literally touching the side of the big water barrel.

Total losses:
Rio Red grapefruit ( heaters too small)
Seville
Bergamot ( too damaged to keep but alive)
Shiranui ( valley- no power)
Sugar Belle ( valley-no power)
Ichang lemon ( valley-no power)
Citradia air layer ( covered only, no barrel)
Citradia on poncirus air layer unprotected
Citrumelo 80-5 unprotected
Thomasville unprotected
Dunstan unprotected
Benton unprotected

Alive but severely damaged by house and got power back after two hours without it:
Owari
Kimbrough

Minimal leaf loss or tips of leaves damaged with power off two hours:
Seedless Changsha on flying dragon
Meiwa kumquat ( gets heat from French drain on south side of house)
Croxton grapefruit ( French drain south side of the house)
Saint Anne ( has two large barrels up against west side of tree)

My best survivors that didn’t have ground heat from French drain and only water barrels in a cold frame when heaters went out are Saint Anne and Changsha. My potted grafted-on-poncirus citrumelos and citradia trees were also undamaged.



5
Cold Hardy Citrus / Re: Zygotic Poncirus hybrids
« on: February 09, 2023, 07:21:36 PM »
So, is the bigger seedling the clone or the little one?

6
Cold Hardy Citrus / Re: shiranui sumo citrus
« on: January 29, 2023, 06:38:27 PM »
My in ground shiranui lost 70% of its height last winter when we went to 14 degrees one night in March and I think my heaters l’un cold frames didn’t come on. It came back to three feet high this year but again, I went to 8 degrees for two hours with no electricity so no heaters, then next day 2 degrees and below freezing temps for almost a week while I was on vacation in Fl for a week. The shiranui looks bad again but trunk still green above graft line. The fruit doesn’t ripen until January commercially. I have one in a pot that I brought inside my house during the single- digit nightmare week, and it has one large green fruit on it now. Stuff ripens late for me here.

7
Cold Hardy Citrus / Re: Zygotic Poncirus hybrids
« on: January 18, 2023, 07:42:45 PM »
So, if flying dragon is 50% zygotic, is that why some of my flying dragon seeds make seedlings that resemble standard poncirus with straight trunks and thorns? That would imply that flying dragon would be good to try making hybrids with, right?

8
Cold Hardy Citrus / Re: Viability of seeds from frozen fruit
« on: January 16, 2023, 09:15:25 PM »
I washed and planted the seeds today. They actually look as good as any others I have planted in the past. Thanks, guys.

9
Cold Hardy Citrus / Re: Viability of seeds from frozen fruit
« on: January 16, 2023, 01:26:11 PM »
What do y’all think ? Worth cleaning these up and planting them?




10
Cold Hardy Citrus / Viability of seeds from frozen fruit
« on: January 15, 2023, 05:34:04 PM »
All the fruit on my Seville froze in December. Is it possible that the seeds inside the ruined fruit could be viable ?  The fruit was not fully ripe, still green when frozen to death.


11
Cold Hardy Citrus / Re: Citrus damage after freeze
« on: January 04, 2023, 09:44:03 PM »
Thanks, Millet.

12
Cold Hardy Citrus / Re: Fall harvest sour orange ?
« on: January 04, 2023, 09:42:16 PM »
Thanks for the response, Galatians. I’ll look that one up.

13
Cold Hardy Citrus / Re: Citrus damage after freeze
« on: January 03, 2023, 08:23:15 PM »
Another problem I am facing is that since my trees have grown bigger over the past ten years, I’ve made my cold frames larger, so now I have more air space to heat inside the enclosures, which means adding heaters. I’ve added more water barrels, but it becomes a volumetric math problem to figure how much supplemental heating I need for the size of the enclosure. I think the size of the tree itself is a factor also since it also takes up air space and it’s canopy helps hold heat under it. I also have fewer potted seedlings inside my enclosures this year also. The watered pots also add a passive heating effect and reduce the amount of air volume my small heater has to heat up.

14
Cold Hardy Citrus / Re: Citrus damage after freeze
« on: January 03, 2023, 07:34:07 AM »
Yes, the 2 degrees F was outside temperature. I have used a digital thermometer about 6 years ago and noticed that the Rio Red got down to 19 degrees inside tent with heater on when it was zero degrees outside. The tree survived with minimal leaf damage. During that polar vortex, the outside temperature dropped a degree every minute as soon as sun went down, and dropped a degree every few seconds inside tent when heater turned off. This proved to me that I have to have heaters and cover citrus to keep them alive here.

15
Cold Hardy Citrus / Fall harvest sour orange ?
« on: January 02, 2023, 09:12:13 PM »
Is there a sour orange / citrus aurantium that will have mature fruit for fall harvest? My Seville fruits from last year never fully colored up even into the next summer, and this year’s crop was lost still fully green with last week’s severe prolonged freeze. Bad variety for me.

16
Cold Hardy Citrus / Re: Citrus damage after freeze
« on: January 02, 2023, 09:00:25 PM »
I was having lows in single digits two days in a row with a known low of 2 degrees F, and not above freezing day and night from Friday through sometime the following Tuesday last week. I also lost power for two hours and couldn’t get generator started Friday morning as temperatures plunged to 8 degrees with a high that day of 11 degrees. All of my store-quality citrus have massive leaf damage but no trunk splits noted yet. Most of my Citradia trees, Dunstan, 80-5, Thomasville, Benton citrange that are unprotected only showing mild to moderate leaf damage. One large citradia on east side of an unheated cold frame with yuzu in it actually looks unscathed for now. The yuzu in unheated frame looks remarkably good with some leaf damage only.

I had to cut back on my use of space heaters due to inadequate amount of electricity to support my 15 outdoor trees in cold frames covered in 4 mil plastic sheeting. Each frame has potted citrus seedlings and grafted trees also. The poncirus hybrids even the newly grafted potted ones are unscathed.

My winners for this event so far with only one 250 watt space heater inside each enclosure are:
Saint Anne Satsuma ; only a few burnt leaves.

Seedless Changsha on flying dragon; few burnt leaves only.

Meiwa kumquat ; no leaf damage but lost all fruit.

Trees with moderate leaf damage in frames:
Croxton
Owari
Kimbrough
Seville sour orange : all fruit lost
Bergamot
Yuzu: unheated frame w 50 gallon water barrel

Trees with severe leaf loss:
Rio Red grapefruit : fruit lost
Changsha : unprotected
Shiranui
Sugar Belle
Ichang lemon

All frames have at least one water barrel and all at least one 250 watt space heater w larger frames having two heaters and two or three barrels.
I’m having another electric outlet installed outside by electrician next Monday.


17
Cold Hardy Citrus / Re: Citrus damage after freeze
« on: December 29, 2022, 08:39:52 AM »
I had a five-foot-tall citradia die one spring after it put out two inches of new growth after last freeze and noticed that the trunk split on south side of tree. I think it was a zero-degree winter that year.

18
Cold Hardy Citrus / Re: Poncirus from Seattle Arboretum
« on: November 28, 2022, 09:53:58 PM »
Is poncirus rare or difficult to grow there?

19
Citrus General Discussion / Re: First time citrus (Beginner)
« on: November 23, 2022, 07:52:22 PM »
I use miracle grow potting mix to start seeds and for initial potting of seedlings. Once I pot up to one gallon pot or at least by two gallon size, I have found that my citrus grow better in 50:50 mix ( miracle grow garden soil and Turface), since after a year the miracle grow potting soil turns into dense mud that sometimes lets water pond on top of the soil instead of draining through. I use the potting soil for native trees and non citrus stuff like red buds, rowan, crabapple, etc.

20
Citrus General Discussion / Re: when to pick Chandler pummelo?
« on: November 21, 2022, 04:53:00 PM »


This is my first Chandler fruit on a tree l got from Madison citrus last year. It’s in a pot in my living room. Overwintered last year in a greenhouse just fine. I too wonder when to harvest it. It’s huge, but I assume it needs to turn yellow before it’s ready. I’ve seen them much bigger too.

21
Cold Hardy Citrus / Re: My Ichang lemon pics 10/24/22
« on: November 04, 2022, 02:40:50 PM »
Zest from my Lakeland limequat was good and they make excellent lime pie. My bergamot and Saint Teresa lemon make good zest too.

22
Cold Hardy Citrus / Re: Name of citrumelo from chillypalmtree
« on: November 03, 2022, 08:08:28 PM »
I called him several years ago and said Dunstan

23
Citrus General Discussion / Re: experimenting with clay soil in containers
« on: November 02, 2022, 06:56:06 AM »
Trifoliata performs better when not in clay or soggy conditions. When I changed from regular potting soil to 50:50 mix of Turface and Miracle Grow Garden Soil, my poncirus seedlings started  growing very well. I fertilize with Osmacote and miracle grow. From your pics, what you’re doing is Bonsai with a fruit tree. According to my bonsai books, when making bonsai out of fruit trees versus non-fruiting trees such as pine, you need a deeper pot to accommodate more root mass, especially when first starting a specimen to help build trunk caliper. You need more roots to sustain fruits. They make bonsai soil you can buy pre bagged. Probably get it online. I used to be a member of the bonsai society in Gainesville FL. A local bonsai group may be resourceful for you.

24
Citrus Buy, Sell, & Trade / Re: Looking for Yuzu rooted cuttings/seeds
« on: October 29, 2022, 07:29:11 AM »
I’m too lazy to look it up, but is yuzu seed going to be true or hybrid? Polyembryonic? I know ichangensis makes hybrids. I’m thinking better off with cuttings or grafts.

25
Citrus General Discussion / Re: My first Santa Teresa lemon fruit
« on: October 27, 2022, 07:28:49 AM »
You’re welcome

Pages: [1] 2 3 ... 39