Citrus > Citrus General Discussion

Do Satsumas get better with age?

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edweather:
We have a young Owari Satsuma a few years old, and it has about 20 fruits this year. The juice is sweet, but they are hard to eat, and chew, and you have spit a chunk of pulp after every bite. Our neighbor has a mature Satsuma, and the fruit melts in your mouth, and is really sweet. Will ours improve with age? I hope so. Thanks.

brian:
I had a small owari that was never all that healthy, it would grow some, fruit some, and die back some.  Eventually it died completely.  However, the fruit was always very good!  I wonder if it is the growing conditions rather than the age of the tree that is the issue for you.  Or could be just bad luck :)

countryboy1981:
It may have something to do with age or the ability to hold more fruit.  The more fruit a tree holds onto the smaller the fruit tend to be (at least for me).  The small fruit are sweeter and do not have the issues you are speaking of.  I give the larger satsumas to my chickens to eat.

Oolie:
Some fruit trees don't show their colors until 3 years after first fruit. For some varieties it's much longer.

Mandarins in particular are said to take 7 years to show their true colors. This does vary with rootstock, dwarfing rootstocks producing satisfactory fruit in much shorter times.

I've eaten so many gold nugget mandarins, and they are almost all as you described. Hard, pebbly, dry flesh, often with off flavors, I've tasted cilantro in GN. I'd never plant one if that was my only example, though it was repeated so many times.

GN is good when from a mature tree, sweet and juicy. Fruit trees are for the patient.

Millet:
edweather, when you say our tree is a few years of age.  I take that to mean the tree is 2 years old.  Most citrus varieties do not produce quality fruit until at least 5 years old at the earliest  As the saying goes...... Good things come to those who wait..

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