Hi Mike, What else can I explain to you because you seem to understand. I think the concept need's to be taken within reason. Total number of nodes or perhaps total number of contiguous nodes which would amount to a certain vegetative size or mass likely has to be fulfilled too. I think that idea of contiguous branching is the missing element in pushing a juvenile into fruiting. That could explain why some seedling citrus become vegetative giants in a tropical greenhouse without going mature. They have many contiguous nodes from unstressed growth but little contiguous branching from unstressed growth. Start stressing a highly vegetative tropical greehouse juvenile with some repeated droughts and it will often go fruiting. The drought stress kills the tip and new growth will be contiguous branching which seem's to follow a idea of contiguous branching being a factor. All I have ever read on the subject is that abstract which I found in a Google search several years ago. However it made perfect sense and my first trial a contiguous branching pruning seemed to work. I welcome you to buy that article and read it.

6 years old is still very juvenile in terms of tree life spans. Some species of Crataegus (hawthorn) take >30 years on a good site to flower/fruit. Look, we tend to think of the age of plants in the same manner we think of age in humans or animals, chronologically. We, like plants, go through several life stages. Embryonic, juvenile, adolescent (intermediate in plants), and mature, are human stages roughly mirrored in plants. Where we vary greatly is in the way our cells age. In animals, body cells all mature at approximately the same speed. Plants grow by consecutive divisions of cells at the growing points (meristems), so their various parts are different ages (the top of the plant, or the ends of branches and stems are younger than the basal (lowest part, just above roots) portions, chronologically, but there is another way of aging plants. The ontogenetic age of plants is related to how many times a cell has to divide to make that particular portion of tissue. Basically, the closer the tissue is to the roots the younger it is ontogenetically, even though chronologically, it is the oldest. I got off track a little, but let's look at why this is important & how does it applies to your tree. In trees from seed, the entire organism is juvenile dynamic mass. Plant's tissues need to attain a certain ontogenetic age before they are physiologically capable of producing reproductive parts (flowers/fruit), so you must wait for the tissues to reach that age. Cuttings, on the other hand, retain their ontogenetic age and so flower/fruit much sooner (chronologically), but you must remember that the tissues are already much older ontogenetically. You would think that cuttings taken from the same plant would roughly flower/fruit at the same time? Not so. Tip cuttings from the higher parts of the tree will flower/fruit sooner than cuttings taken from the basal (close to the roots) part of the tree. There is a trade off here though. The basal cuttings will be more juvenile and have retained more genetic vigor and will root more readily than the older wood. Hope this wasn't too confusing? Al

Yes, looks like the rootstock variety Citrumelo. You can tell because it has mainly trifoliate leaves - central leaf with a smaller leaf each side. However, it is possible that one of the trunks on your tree is still the original variety. It's not possible to see in your photos but check whether any branch has different leaves - only single leaves without the side ones. If so, you could cut off all other branches and leave the 'proper' one to grow.

As for the fig do a lot of research to separate the gems from the dogs. black berries are self reproducing. Plant them in a row and they will produce the second year and thinning the excessive runners can be done with a weed whacker. Kumquats have a sweet skin and the Meiwa variety has sweet flesh when ripe. Pop the whole thing in your mouth. Sweet lemons and limes are acid-less varieties of the sour fruit. They have low sugar so they taste mildly sweet. I eat them like oranges out of hand am very new at citrus growing but have over 2 decades with apple, peaches, pears, cherries, and plums. It is very important that you time the fruiting of each of your particular trees with the quality and quantity of available sunlight for the area it is planted. Trees that may not get enough sunlight from above will need to get sunlight from east and west and will need more space between them. I have only picked and eaten one citrus fruit (Cuban Shaddock) that I picked to soon. My trees are small and I have only eaten store bought citrus. I have however picked between 300-400 figs and they are much easier to grow, variety Hardy Chicago.