Hey, I remember when I was first excited to use the good mix too...You would be amazed at how awesome trees do in the stuff you are so anxiously waiting to use..By the way, great idea about soaking the bark! It is even so clean looking and just beautiful to match that beautiful tree.. I wonder about that mix it came in..It looks like it is ready to break down fast already..Hard to really tell..It looks like it would be good draining for one season more. Let me ask you this..This is your homework. Call that place tomorrow and ask them specific questions about the care your tree just came from and what kind of mix they use. Here is what I would ask them to help give your tree a head start and to mimick as close as they did. 1. What exactly is in their mix? 2. How long has the tree been in that same pot? 3. What kind of warmth did it recieve? 4. How much sunlight did they get? 5. Were they grown outside or in a controlled environment, like a greenhouse? 6.Did they use any type of acidifyer product? 7. What was teh fertilizer they used? By the way, what Zone do you live in? Where in the world? Will you have to winter it inside or will you be able to expose it to full sun all winter long? Does it get cold there? That will determin if you can use a less than ideal mix to carry you over until spring) MIke This post was edited by meyermike_1micha on Thu, Oct 30, 14 at 17:30

You shouldn't have to do anything crazy with the citrus. If we get a cold winter, you should probably cover it. If we get a hard freeze of less than 28 degrees for 4 hours then you better get your butt in gear. Personally, I put C9 christmas lights on my trees and then cover them with a blanket. They are good for a pretty cold night this way. As for hibiscus, they are very prone to aphids and other sapsuckers. I found sprays to be a pain in the butt and only effective for a few days before the next batch hit. The only way to go, in my opinion, is a systemic insecticide like imidacloprid. You will have no problems once you do this. It also protects against gall midge, which is a bug which lays eggs in a small flower bud. The larvae eat the flower from the inside and cause it to drop off. No spray of oil, soap, or alcohol can prevent it. I had it bad before I started using systemics on my hibiscus. Hibiscus will often stop flowering after planting, and they will often drop leaves too. Usually they recover in a couple weeks and start blooming. Too much water also seems to make them stop blooming and drop leaves in my experience. I know weve been really wet around here lately. Then again, look for flower bud drop because you might have gall midge stopping blooms.

In 2017, I planted 5 lemon seeds from a bag of sweet meyer lemons and they’re all varying in growth. The tallest one had some flowers in spring but nothing more. Long, sharp thorns on all of them and the trunks are getting thick. I’m about ready to puts them on the curb because they are tough to bring inside for winters. Is there any hope they will ever bear fruit?

Monica I bought a half pound box of Nagami kumquats at Kroger grocery. They were small and they had seeds. I did a years worth of research and decided to order a 10 pound box of Meiwa kumquats from Florida kumquat growers Inc. They were delicious and I planted 300+ Meiwa seeds. I also bought Poncirus Trifoliata seeds since my research showed that kumquats from seeds were a no go. Out of 300 seeds I had 2 plants left and one thrown into the compost heap as low quality. My 2 died and I rescued the compost victim. 1 years later it was clear that I could not graft to PT. I planted seeds and ended up with 4 sweetlee tangerine trees for rootstock. They grew very nicely and are the pride of my citrus fleet. My Meiwa died and that was the end of my citrus career. A friend moved and gave me her 2 Meyer lemon trees. They did well so I built a greenhouse and kept the tangerine trees and the 2 Meyer lemon trees. 2 of my tangerine trees tripled in size over winter into spring and the Meyers doubled in size. A friends gave me a grafted Meiwa kumquat and 2 seed grown Fukushu kumquat trees while another friend sent me The New Zealand lemonade tree, all mentioned above While doing all this I bought a fig tree and it took off and I have rooted over 30 cuttings that all produced figs. I can produce easily 500 to 2000 figs a year going into next season. The Hardy Chicago fig has been a real winner for me. This past year I harvested more figs than 5 apple trees of 20 feet. More than 17 full size peach trees 1 plum tree, 2 paw paw trees, 2 cherry trees, 7 blue berry bushes, almost as much as my black berries. At current I have a total of 6 citrus trees gifted to me and 3 tangerine trees from seed. All 9 are doing well#3 above is in ground #4 above is in ground I believe I know enough to get set up to produce most if not all of the citrus fruit we would eat in a year and do it cost effectively. I am there with the figs. Gardening is a labor of love. I will repeat that growing citrus trees take a real commitment to do well and is ONLY easy when the trees are not having problems. I will also say if you are growing for foliage then grow from seed from fruit. If you are growing for fruit start a bunch of trees from seed and learn on them for 2 years before buying a grafted tree. You get more fruit sooner if you blow 2 years growing from seed first as you go over the learning curve. I can say now I really enjoy my trees