Thanks Ilya! Very interesting.

Van. Bless your heart and your trees. As a fellow zone 7a/6b'er, I must advise you to protect those baby trees from the freeze for the next few winters. I tried planting my two-year old trifoliate hybrid seedlings and a Changsha cutting grafted on trifoliate one summer and covered them with plastic sheeting over wire dome cages that I ventilated on days with highs in 50's, and heated them with heat lamp bulbs on freezing nights. They all did well until I took the plastic off and heat lamps off in spring. These trees made it without dropping leaves all winter with lows in single digits, but I lost the Changsha mandarin graft after only two nights on separate weeks with lows of 19 degrees when unprotected. The trifoliate hybrids were unaffected. My 4-ft tall Kimbrough satsuma was unscathed on year in its plastic covered enclosure when the power was out all day and night and of course it's space heater was not working, with a high of 19 degrees during the day; I don't know how cold it got that night because I abandoned my home that afternoon to shelter at friends house at lower elevation, since ground covered in snow and ice. The water barrel in greenhouse with Kimbrough probably saved it that night, that and fact it was not a new graft at that point. New grafts more susceptible to cold.

I've eaten Dunstan citrumelo and as a native Floridian of 3 generations, it tastes to me like one of grandpa's old white grapefruits that as a kid, I thought of as bitter, but now as an adult, appreciate its grapefruit quality for what it is. My dunstan a which I grew from seed, survived last year with no protection and hardly dropped any leaves. I wish one of the prominent growers that can ship citrus would graft dunstan and Ichang lemon onto trifoliate or dragon so those of us in northern climes can enjoy fruit off of smaller trees that are easier to protect during "polar vortexes".

Thomasville citrangquat becomes more unifoliate as it gets older. Mine is only a few years old, and as the trunk and branches get longer, most leaves are unifoliate and less trifoliate. Nansho dai dai is very hardy sour orange that is unifoliate.

My dunstan citrumelos that went unprotected this past winter defoliated but didn't die back, and they're only 3 ft tall. The two that I tried covering with frost cloth through most of the winter almost died and lost most of they're trunk bark. The trifoliate hybrids and Ichang and nansho dai dai in my high tunnel hardly lost any leaves this past winter with only barrels of water for passive heating. Think I had a low of 10 degrees one night this winter. Lost almost everything the year before when didn't get above freezing all January with low of zero all night long twice. My owari and Kimbrough have survived the past several winters with plastic sheeting, water barrels, and small space heaters controlled by Thermo cubes. The owari and Kimbrough produce well and taste great. I'll try to post pic of one of my dunstan a that went unprotected this winter.

Excellent. Sweet. Seedless. Easy to peel.

I got this grapefruit tree grafted on flying dragon from a reputable grower in SC who got his Crocston trees from the original grapefruit tree grown by his neighbor, Mr Crocston. He gave me a fruit off his tree back in March of 2013, and it was a light pink inside. I've seen Stan Mckenzie cut one of his Crocston fruits in November and it was light pink. I have a Rio Red grapefruit on flying dragon that gave me fruit last January but the inside was not red but barely a light peach color. My question is why? Do pink grapefruit need high summer heat to turn pink/red? I don't get a lot of summer heat in the mountains here. Or do my fruit need more time to fully ripen and turn from white to pink. I noted a slight pink blush on the albedo/ rind of this "Crocston ".

I went to the southeastern citrus expo in Moncton, SC this November, and learned about "heat units" needed for citrus to grow. The climatologist said citrus need the temperature to be at least 55 degrees F for citrus to grow, he showed the difference in annual heat units from FL to SC to Wilmington,NC, which was significant. I'm in the mountains of NC, and my citrus doesn't break dormancy until May or June, and it rarely gets into the 90's at my house. I think certain plants like citrus and tomatoes need hot weather to really put on growth. I have a Star grapefruit that didn't put on a strong flush of growth until September this year.

Thanks. They did ripen a month earlier this year.

Ok. My sats are still green but some turning yellow but all are really puffy. Does that mean they are ripe already? I know they say some sats can be eaten green but mine weeny puffy like this last year in December when yellow/ orange.

I've had Ichang lemon. It tastes like lemon and is large and just one fruit before cut, put off a wonderful lemony fragrance that filled the entire kitchen. It was full of lemon juice and seeds. I planted seeds from one fruit and got twenty trees. Makes beautiful leaves and survived zero degrees here last year with plastic hoop house/ high tunnel with 35 gallon garbage can full of water for passive heat source.

Here is photo of fall color on my wild sorbus.