more pics from rolled leaf

meyer lemon

my two santa teresa lemons next to each other and one looks lighter then the other one.
nutritional deficiency on arrival??

closeup of a discolored leaf

Okay, first, plastic pots are actually better than clay pots, especially if you're using a well draining potting mix. Most of the container folks here will mix their own container mix, because most bagged mixes simply do not drain well and will eventually compress (despite what they say on their label). If you search our forum for "gritty mix" or "511 mix", you'll find the recipes. I would bookmark them for future reference. Sounds like your mix might be a bit heavy, and consistent rain is going to possibly make them a little water logged.

Secondly, 50 degrees is not cold for citrus. You are safe to leave them outside until temps threaten to drop below 35 degrees. I take it you are not in citrus country? Not sure where you live, looks like zone 6?? If you've purchased trees from Duarte or from Four Winds, the trees are used to being outside, but I would still work them into full sun over about 2 weeks, just to make sure they don't have any shock issues from light changes. Then, keep them in full sun.

Fertilize with every watering. Most folks here prefer to use DynaGro's Foliage Pro. Full strength during the spring, summer, early fall, 1/2 strength the rest of the year. The paler St. Teresa could be due to a little nutrional deficiency or a little more transplant shock. Excessive rain will wash out nutrients, so protect from too much rain, so you can better regulate the water and fertilizer.

Patty S.

thank you patty. will leave my babies out tonight :)
should i move them inside when it is raining?
is the DynaGro's Foliage Pro considered organic?
sometimes i think some growers pushing their plants too much and is like feeding big breed pups too much protein. slower grow might be better of course without sacrifice the nutrition they need. wrong with plants??
what about the rolled leaves? just from transport or re-potting shock?

I second all of what patty said. 10 out of 10 times she is correct.

I use foliage pro but I find it hard to use it with every watering. Here in Oklahoma it is not uncommon for me to have to water every other day. that would get expensive. What I do is water my trees really well and then later that same day water them again with the foliage pro at 1/4 teaspoon per gallon. I also use an amount of vinegar to bring my water to around if not below a PH of 7. For me that works out to a Teaspoon per gallon. I do this every weekend. I also have a slow release mixed into the soil. I have no idea if its of benefit or not but makes me feel better, LOL

My trees dont appear to be lacking but if they are its just a little bit. Most all of mine have had multiple growth flushes and all have bloomed at least twice since winter.

keep in mind this is what works for me so take as just that.

Mike

until the day before yesterday, i used to water my plants with water that runs trough softener. now i know better and will use my well water. only problem it is very hard. will vinegar help with that? it also has a lot of iron. what to do about that?
should i put my citrus plants inside when raining?

Iron is fine for your trees. You can always add a tiny bit of vinegar to the water (1 tbsp per gal) if you need to reduce the pH. And yes, you're right, no softened water, way too much salt for container plants of any kind.

Patty S.

I have noticed that all my potted citrus and guavas respond really well to foliar feeding. Spraying plant food mixed in water on the leaves seems to turn them around quicker than feeding them in the soil. It doesn't seem to matter what the food is either. What matters is that the water needs to be as close to neutral as possible and that you want a weak mix of water and fertilizer.

could i use the foliage fertilizer in freshly previous bare rooted plants? without hurting or burning them?
i will add a little vinegar to the water and i think it is time to install some rain barrels.

You can, susanne. I get the same results with Foliage Pro on the roots as I have with a foliar spray, so I say, whatever is the easiest thing to do. I also use Osmocote Plus (the Plus version has sadly been discontinued, so I'm looking for an equivalent time release product) to help span between feedings which has served my container citrus very well. I say, whatever will work the easiest and best for you, and give you good results. It takes a little experimenting to figure out what works best for you and in your climate.

Patty S.

thank you patty, mike and john.
this group is very helpful and i hope with all your help i will be able to keep my little collection alive and growing.
will order the foliage grow and start with that.

Patty, I believe you have it backwards regarding water softness/hardness.
Hard water has high concentrations of dissolved metal salts (mainly calcium carbonate and magnesium carbonate plus a few others).
Soft water has had some or all of the dissolved salts removed (or exchanged) via ion exchange, reverse osmosis, distillation, etc...

Susanne, first, overall your trees look to be in good shape, the curled leaves may just be shipping/transplant shock. I don't think I've ever received a citrus tree via mail order that didn't show some level of stress after shipping. Second, Patty's advice about needing to experiment a bit to see what works best for you is spot on. Third, I'm not sure I would worry to much about your water source unless know for sure that it is causing problems with the health of your trees. In any case, if you are worried about salt buildup in your potting mix, then stick with the softened water. Or even better, collect rainwater from your gutters w/ a cistern. Since you are in the Midwest, your tap and/or well water have the potential to be very hard if they originate from an area with limestone (which is calcium carbonate) deposits.

Also, depending on how your water softener system works, it may result in an increase in the pH of the water (making it more basic) as a side product of the softening process. This could be a more valid reason for not using your softened water. You may want to get a pH test kit, which should be available at any pet store that sells aquariums, to test it.

Cheers and best of luck with your trees!

This post was edited by Scott_6B on Thu, Jun 6, 13 at 14:47

Scott, nearly all home water softening systems here in California use salt (unless you have a reverse osmosis system, which is less common here and are more expensive). Hard water contains large amounts of calcium and magnesium. Water-softening systems that use salt replace calcium and magnesium ions with sodium ions. It's not a huge amount of salt, but it can be enough to both container plants, including citrus. Suzanne does not say why type of water softening system she has, but if she's adding bags of salt to her system, she has this type of system.

Patty S.

thank you scott. yes i will test the water. i'm in michigan and we have a lot of clay in our soil. don't know about limestone but i know the water is very hard.
i started to use distilled water for my orchids since that is the water needed for my pitcher plants. but if i have to buy the water for all containers it might get a bit pricey.

ups, just saw the post from patty. yes we use salt as water softerner. there is also something added to take the iron out
(who wants yellow t-shirts)
maybe i can figure something out to to the reverse osmosis for the water used for the container plants

Just use your well water, Susanne. It will be just fine. Extra calcium, magnesium and iron are actually beneficial for citrus. If the pH is about 8.0, then add a little vinegar. Otherwise, your well water should be just fine.

Patty S.

You can buy a relatively cheap, under the sink reverse osmosis unit; or barring that, you can buy RO water for very little; or set up a system to save rain water; or as Patty said, just use your well water; it is sooooo much better than water from a water "softener".

I apologize for drifting a little off topic, but as a Chemist I'm curious as to why the consensus seems to be that ion exchange-based soft water is so bad? It should not be much different than the same water before treatment with the water softener. If anything it could be marginally better. Personally, I do not have a water softener, nor do I necessarily advocate using one for watering plants. I've just seen similar comments about water here and elsewhere, but have never seen a good scientific explanation.

Scott,
It ain't rocket science; water softeners replace "hard" salts with "soft" salts, namely sodium chloride (table salt). If you put table salt on a plant, it will KILL it; the salts it replaces may make your pipes clog, or cause stains in your toilet or sink , but they WON'T kill your plants...

Sorry for being so assertive... I have a degree in Agriculture from UC Davis and a minor in chemistry... if ; you are better educated than me, please enlighten me.

John,
Don't worry about thinking your are being too assertive... no offense is taken. I'm just genuinely curious as to why the soft water is perceived as being so terrible. I often see many quite firm statements on a variety of topics (water, fertilizer, temperature, sunlight, methods for planting in ground, etc...) related home gardening. There is a sound horticultural basis behind many of these recommendations, but at the same time I see many firm recommendations that for most people likely make no difference one way or the other. I don't see the point of having this huge list of varying do's and don'ts if a large portion of the recommendations either are minimally helpful, or don't really have any impact.

When I began growing container citrus several years ago, I started out all gung-ho trying to do everything under the sun that was recommended to make my trees happy especially in winter (grow lights, supplemental heating, boosting the humidity, etc...). The end result invariably was sickly looking trees. I've had much better luck not really doing too much and allowing the trees to acclimate gradually on their own to whatever their current environment happens to be.

Getting back to the soft water question. I completely agree that too much sodium chloride will kill plants, especially citrus. I would also add that too much salt of any kind could kill your plants, of course the lethal concentrations will vary quite widely depending on the specific toxicities.
An ion exchange water softener does not add sodium chloride to the water. The sodium chloride is just used to regenerate the ion exchange resin by saturating it with sodium ions. The softening process only replaces the magnesium and calcium ions with sodium. The primary anion before and after treatment should remain carbonate, no additional chloride is added. Since sodium carbonate is much more soluble in water than either magnesium or calcium carbonate, one could argue that it would be more difficult to build up high concentrations of it in the container. This is assuming that one flushes their container with excess water on a semi regular basis. Nevertheless, I doubt this aspect really makes much significant difference one way or the other if the container is being flushed with water periodically.
While thinking about this whole issue, I also came across several research papers that investigate the effects of salinity on citrus. The primary toxic effects of "salinity" on citrus are increased osmotic stress and specific ion toxicities. Again, if one is flushing their container with water semi-regularly, osmotic stress should never become an issue, as the excess accumulated salts will be washed out regularly. With respect to ion toxicity, the general consensus seems to be that chloride is a more significant issue than sodium. However, the water softening process does not really add any chloride to the the treated water, therefore its concentration is no different than in the untreated water. The concentration of sodium carbonate in the "softened" water is also not really ever going to be that high (in the neighborhood of 200 ppm, if the input water is classified as very hard). I've seen a study (link below) that subjected citrus to salt (sodium chloride and/or calcium chloride) at concentrations up to 6000 ppm. Although the differences in response to the salt challenge were clearly noticeable among the tested cultivars, the most significantly damaged trees only showed a "slight marginal burn" on the leaves. So even assuming there was 200 ppm sodium chloride in the softened water, it would take several months of watering with no flushing of the soil to build up to these high salt concentrations where there are clearly visible toxicity effects.
In summary, I do not see any scientific basis for why "softened" water should be perceived as so bad for citrus culture. At the same time, there is not much evidence that it has any significant benefits. In the absence of finding any direct studies investigating this question, I think the issue is largely irrelevant for container citrus culture. If a few basic care practices are observed (mainly not treating your soil as a black hole in which an infinite amount of fertilizer and soluble salts from the water supply can be allowed to accumulate), it shouldn't really matter. I will add one final caveat, if signs of salt toxicity do happen to appear irrespective of the water source, then one should absolutely start trying to isolate and correct the problem.

John, I'm curious to know if you have any additional thoughts.
In any case, cheers, and thanks for the discussion!

-Scott

PS Susan, my sincere apologies for taking your thread off on a little tangent.

Here is a link that might be useful: Salt tolerance of some citrus

for the time being i will use my well water with a little bit of vinegar and as soon as the rain barrels are up and running i will use rain water.
should be no problem :))

Adjusting the trees to the sun, as mentioned, will prevent some of the stress response. I think I see sunburn in one of the pics.

I'd personally wait another week before resuming the fertilization...although, if going organic, the nutrients will most likely take a week (or more) just to become available...so it's up to you.

Josh

no, definitely no sunburn on any of the citrus trees....yet.
and i will wait another week or so before using fertilizer.
checking everyday a couple of times if i see any development. but nothing yet.
how long does it take to see new growth?

Cool. I mistook this leaf-glare for sunblanch....

that is a play with shade :))
i'm not a professional photographer. just wanted to show the rolled leafs.
i'm checking almost every hour to see if there is any change in the trees. only the slightest signs of either too hot or looking stressed, they will go under the big tree in the shade. at least for another week or two. then they should be fine in the sun i think.

thank you for looking so careful to my little ones. sometimes others can see something that i might have missed. i really want to get them going and get some nice fruits next year.