Key Lime Losing Leaves
jallen26
18 years ago
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birdsnblooms
18 years agojallen26
18 years agoRelated Discussions
Key Lime vs. Thornless & Giant Key Lime Tree??
Comments (16)According to the "book" and what I've read thornless don't yield as much. Whether it's enough to matter to the average homeowner I don't know. Also IME Persian Limes (especially) & Key Limes are very underrated for their cold hardiness. TRUE Lemons are over rated. I have about 20 citrus trees in the ground and my Tahitian lime is one of the hardiest & most cold hardy here in zone 9B. The only citrus trees I have ever lost to low temps were a full sized Harvey Lemon and a mid sized Varney Navel tree back in our record 2010 freeze here when he got down to about 20. Nothing else even got burned. I have seen a lot of nurseries saying Tahitian limes are cold sensitive and I have not found that to be the case. Lemons I have....See MoreLime comparison - key lime vs. "giant" key lime vs. limequat
Comments (17)Parker T - > just FYI - in my particular yards, I had conflicting scenarios (after dips to 18-19F) but have a different preference. I've "soured" on any cultivar with 'quat in its name; they are not as cold hardy as I had hoped. In Napa, the Eustis Limequat (on Volk) was killed to just about the graft - regrew and is now 10 ft. tall - took over a year. The Bearss lime just lost its leaves and refoliated, produced a huge crop right away. In Danville, the Bearrs lime was completely destroyed, the Volk rootstock lived. While the Eustis in my neighbor's yard was defoliated and came back. From what I've seen since, the Eustis fruit gets destroyed quickly when the temps go below freezing. The Bearss lime fruit can and has survived to 29/30F. So my vote is for the Bearss or Persian lime -because I want fruit! - far better for my climate's fall/winter dips below freezing. - George...See MoreLime tree losing green leaves & new leaves with yellow spots (pics)
Comments (11)You could try and prune it to a smaller size maybe if you wish to keep it in a smaller pot, my key lime is quite small and it went through several flowering cycles this year. Citrus are heavy feeders so providing enough nutrients is key. I use granular citrus fertilizer on a monthly basis just topdress the soil, and when my plants are fruiting and flowering I use a water soluble fertilizer weekly. They also make water soluble citrus nutrients which can be diluted and sprayed on the leaves. I prefer to apply smaller amounts of nutrients more often. Also I recommend using organic fertilizer, non organic fertilizer will lead to salt build up in the pot. The picture is the kinds of fertilizer I use. In the background you can see some key limes in my fruit basket....See MoreMottled leaves on potted key lime tree.
Comments (14)Update: Mystery solved! I came back home from a trip a week ago, and found the tree had dropped a third of its leaves. On closer inspection I noticed spider mites on the top of many of the remaining leaves. I’ve had spider mites on multiple plants before and usually catch them early as I see the tiny red dots and clean them off. Weeks ago when the yellow spots first appeared, I had looked very carefully on the whole tree and didn’t see any mites. Even zooming in on the photos above, I can’t see mites, although I can see a little bit of stippling. My guess is that they were at a stage I couldn’t see, or were a different type of spider mite than those I’ve seen before. I took the tree outside and treated it with insecticidal soap. This time when it was wet, many tiny webs became visible in the branches - it was heavily infested. I wasn’t sure if the spider mites had infested the tree after it became sick with the mystery yellow spot disease, but on Wednesday I got an email from the agent at the Florida agricultural extension that had responded before, saying she thinks the issue is spider mites! - She had just seen a presentation where the yellow spots were shown as a spider mite symptom, although an unusual one. I really appreciated her following up. It has been a learning experience - I now know that I can’t rely on visual inspection for spider mites, and that if yellow spots appear on a plant, it is a good idea to treat it with neem or insecticidal soap to be safe. I’ve treated my other trees and will repeat treatments on this key lime every few weeks until I’m sure they are eradicated. Hopefully it will survive - it produced a great crop this year. Thanks everyone for your help - and John, thank you for your suggestion of checking for spider mites - I should not have assumed that if I can’t see them, they are not there! Happy holidays!...See Morebirdsnblooms
18 years agoLinda Klaas_Silver
2 years agoSilica
2 years agoponcirusguy6b452xx
2 years agoLinda Klaas_Silver
2 years agolast modified: 2 years agotapla (mid-Michigan, USDA z5b-6a)
2 years agoMeyermike(Zone 6a Ma.)
2 years ago
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tapla (mid-Michigan, USDA z5b-6a)