I don't know anything about the Trovita, but I can say with confidence my experience so far with Four Winds has been exceptional. They provide a lot of the local nurseries I've been buying from and their plants are always lush and healthy, some bearing fruit in the stores, and better than the other suppliers I've seen around. Then, when I wanted a variety that I couldn't find at retail I ordered online direclty from them. Their order process is extremely easy, they ship quickly, the product arrives in GREAT condition, and they can also answer questions by email before you order. The one thing I'd recommend is have your soil components and pot ready and waiting for the arrival, though, because they usually come in plastic "sleeves"... kind of like a bareroot sitting inside a bag of wet cedar chips... so they need to get transplanted immediately. And just be careful, with a 12 x 12' greenhouse, you may very well get addicted and want more than one. I have gone nuts this spring, buying a meyer, 2 owari satsumas, a gold nugget, and a washington navel. And I'm begging DH for more. Good luck!

Greetings Mike, I was in Lowe's tonight and they stock Four Winds Growers trees here in Northern california. Kara Mandarin is available in a 5 gal pot. I was tempted to purchase one but I did not know enough about this mandarin. Nonetheless, Kara is now starting to be available comercially. Hopefully soon they should be available on the website.

Here's my first expereince with FWG: In September when I got the alert that the New Zealand Lemonade was available, I ordered it and contemplated ordering several other tress. I waited too long and missed the STL. I debated about the Genoa, the GN, and the Kishu, but you guys wisely counseled that I not go over board and I thank you for that (there are still at least a half dozen other varieties, that I have to resist the urge to buy on a daily basis!). When I received my NZL, it had spider mite damage and had lost half it's leaves. It had a decent shape and branching, but as I told FWG, it looked like something I would have purchased in the discount section at Lowes. It was my first time ordering with them and I was disappointed, so I sent an email. I received a professional email from Kendra where she basically admitted that they dropped the ball and the NZLs should have never been sold in that condition. They offered me my money back or a replacement tree. So, I opted for a replacement tree because A) I have a problem and B) I wanted to give them another shot. I emailed back and ground with Kendra and gave here a few trees I was interested in and ultimately settled on a Golden Nugget. Everyone is always happy with a GN. She kindly offered to search for a Santa Teresa lemon for me. It took two weeks and I hadn't heard anything, so I nudged a bit. She offered to have a picture taken of both a ST and a GN and let me decided. Another few days goes by, I nudge a little more and it turns out they're sold out of GN. She ended up sending me a picture of the ST and shipping it out the following week. Kendra was ultimately helpful and professional although she did get a little peeved at me when I pointed out the the website listed GN's for sale, but they were sold out and didn't show ST's and they had them (what I perceived as a slight attitude, could have just been me misinterpreting email). She explained that she did me a favor and pulled it from their 'sister site as they are intended for the shift up stock'. I think FWs and Kendra handled it well overall. Status of NZL: I received it about 7 weeks ago. It was tall, but sparse and missing lots of leaves (and they did not fall off during shipping) with spider mite damage. Roughly half of the leaves it had when it arrived turned yellow and fell off. I expect at least a half dozen more to fall off in the coming weeks. It put out a few new growth shoots right before coming inside for the winter, but only 2 survived. I expect that it will recover just fine, but I think it will take until the end of the next growing season at least to look as it should have when it arrived. I pulled it out of it's pot yesterday because I was going to put it in a different size and got a good look at the roots, they look happy and healthy. I do feel a little bit like a snob for complaining because I do think it will be a lovely plant some day (key words being 'some day'), but had I seen it in my local nursery, I never would have paid full price for it. It was not a great example of what FW's has to offer as a first time customer. Status of the ST Lemon: It is a LARGE tree. Like I said, I have no other experience with FW other than my sad NZL. My current citrus collection was all purchase from either my local nursery or Logees. My trees started tiny and most are still quite petite. This ST is a real tree and I'm a little intimidated. It is roughly 33 inches from dirt to talllest branch and 32 inches wide. I've seen all of your pictures, but it's hard to tell how big they really are. (I hear Susanne laughing at me for complaining that my trees are too small. It's going to be quite a jungle when they all get this big.) That being said it is healthy. There are a few leaves with white spots, but it doesn't look like spider mites. This is looks like an iron deficiency or magnesium. I’m not sure I found one buggy on it and I picked it off, wiped all the leaves with a damp paper towel, then a q-tip with alcohol a few times. I sprayed it with Neem oil last night and left it in a separate room. It was growing it what looks to be 100% bark and it was seriously root bound. I'm no expect, but it doesn't appear to be grafted. There are these two tiny shoots just below the main branches. Should I prune them off? There is a small cluster of tiny branches completely devoid of leaves. It's previous pruning does leave something to be desired. It really looks like someone just hacked away at it in odd places. It looks fairly full in the pictures, but really there are three main branches and two are long and gangling. One has no branching at all. They are a little unruly and I'm not sure if I should prune the entire thing back several inches to encourage a full canopy and more branching from the base (like Susanne's Fukushu that she posted yesterday). If I do any pruning, I assume that I should probably do it in the spring? I know a lot of you are antipruning, but I want it to have a nice shape.

The problem is that not all varieties and sizes of trees that I want are available at the same time. I pay the outrageous shipping because I ordered elsewhere and was not happy with the quality even though it was closer to home. Buying in bulk is good only if you are just starting a collection and have lots of money to invest. FedEx ground is good and trees are not damaged after being in a box for 5 days. FW does a good job with packaging too.