I came to this forum many years ago, when I only had Alexander and my Persian lime. They were both small and I remember that Alexander had spider mites and nutritional deficiencies. All of you wonderful and extremely knowledgeable friends taught me, and now I have all these happy trees. They bring me joy and so do you guys. Bob, I’ve learned so much about grafting from you, and Silica, your knowledge of tree biology is immense and I’ve always appreciated your advice and insights. Mike, this forum would not be what it is without your positivity and enthusiasm. There are many more - JohnM, Brian (check in!), Tropic...Amy, your fruit look strong and trees look nice and green. I wish you a nice harvest this winter. I am re-homing my pomelos because, although I love the flowers, I just don’t like the fruit enough to keep them - especially considering how much space they need. They’re going to a great home though! Mike, hang in there with your parents and COVID and stay healthy. Bob, take care and stay healthy too! Keep up those exercises on your own! If I make it to your age, I hope to be as active as you!

And Howard, welcome to our group!

Laura, looking at you in that picture, big smile, you don’t have any problem getting there.

With your family around you and still managed those beautiful trees and what not, I couldn’t do it. Keep that smile going, that’s way I like to see You. Silica, might be a little stingy with the wealth of knowledge he has. This forum needs him as part of the backbone, than there is Steve our in-house rootstock guru/something else. Mike, is sorting things out right now. He be coming back stormin.

That’s true about Steve Bob! He has always been a true innovator. Thank you Bob!!

my lemons trees are growing in clay soil and I'm putting coffee grounds and tea leaves from teabags on top of my soil and I got a question I'm growing regular lemons in zone 6b why didn't the temperatures in the lower 20' damage them

I got a question I'm growing my regular lemon seedlings clay soil why didn't temperatures in the lower 20's and upper teens damage them and I'm in zone 6b just south of the Ohio river

Amy, I'm lovin' that Nam Doc Mai mango. I've heard that's a good one!

I've gotten into mangoes as well. I'm growing a very tall Mallika. I did a successful graft of Haden onto Tommy Atkins rootstock (still quite young).

And I recently did some more grafts of Glenn onto an Ataulfo seedling. More scions to come in the mail! -- Carrie, Pickering and Rosigold! Running out of rootstock! Gotta eat more mangoes and start more seeds!

Mike, if we were in the same country, I would have sent you some violette de Bordeaux cuttings in a heartbeat. Always fun to share with a friend!

Dave, oh I got into mango after Bob sent a picture about his multi graft tree. Oh I can’t wait to see the pictures of your trees. I am still learning how to grow mango and I hope that I won’t kill my trees this time.

My ice cream mango

Flower on my june plum

some starfruit flower

another picture of my ice cream mango

New leaves of my achacha. I am quite surprise of the grow rate of my achacha this year. It’s pushing leaves after leaves which is great because I heard that it’s a slow grower

Dave! Pickering is on my wish list! I heard that it’s a precocious, dwarf and productive one!

I tried to grow mango many years ago with no success. I think I’ll stick to citrus considering my lack of winter space. I hope to hear from all of you of your successes!

Hi everyone!! I’m so so happy to see everyone here bob mike amy laura!! I miss you all!! Just want to pop in and say hello! I’ve been back at work for a week now and boy it’s tough after the long break It’s taking a whole lot out of me I suppose retirement will have to wait! If you can believe it I haven’t even gone out to check my trees in a week!! But we had rain just a few days ago and more rain tomorrow so I’m sure Mother Nature has them covered :) I’ve skimmed through everyone’s posts and just stunned by all the pictures and how beautiful they are!

bob your trees are definitely not looking like they had a rough month! beautiful! Bob you’re going to stick around here for a long while :) I bet that’s what got you off your pills your Amazing fruit Trees will keep you going healthy for a long time! Bob my fig cutting finally has its first leaf! It’s very exciting I’ll try to post a picture tonight.

amy!!! Your trees are so lush and green! How’s the weather been? We have been getting fall like weather here And thus all my trees are growing very slowly just like over winter time. Amy I’m so tempted to get an avocado tree! I can’t believe how beautiful they look :) did you finally get your shipment from Phoenix? Did you get your Shasta and your valentine? Hope they arrived in good condition!

mike my prayers are with you! Stay strong I know how it is being so busy and not even being able to enjoy your trees but the few moments I get to see them when I get home from a crazy day makes it so worth while and it’s somewhat of a stress relief for me and coming to this forum too it really helps me get by :)

laura when did your trees get so huge!!! Alexander is leaps and bounds taller than you! lol I wouldn’t have guessed they’d be in pots :)

im sorry If i missed anyone on here! But ill try to get a couple pictures out tonight.

ok

Sugarbelle finally a bunch of blooms :)

Baby Cocktail grapefruit

Baby kishu! wonder if I should thin the fruit

Xie shan coming back from a hard freeze last winter I accidentally left it outside at -10!

Kiyomi just blooming a handful of fruits

My first shiranui fruit!!! The tree is hanging onto 4 and blooming again!

My largest tree over 7ft tall! My cara cara last year the fruits were so dry! Hoping for juicier fruit this year!

minneola just 3 fruits but lots of new leaf shoots coming out :)

Moro blood orange finally filling out and tons of small fruitlets! Hope they hang on I’ve yet to get fruit from this tree in the four years I’ve had it!

Finally my first graft!! leaves Are flushing and it’s looking great :)

above is about 70% of my collection and my favourite trees! I’m mostly so excited that most of my trees are looking full again!! we had the most brutal winter and some of them dropped tons of leaves even in the greenhouse.

Oh and not citrus but my first fig Leaf from the cutting I got from pino :) can’t wait!

Beautiful tree’s Jan, another success story!! I can see that happy face like Laura’s. You are on your way,! This forum is starting to get a lot of traction. A summer like this will get the ball rolling.

I Remember bob saying if I don’t like the shape of the tree that I should just trim it and shape it from a young age so I cut this gangly variegated pink lemon (with weak new growth) by more than half and it rewarded me by flushing out! in just a little over 3 weeks! It was a tough thing to do For me i felt like crying after I butchered it lol

One last one I promise!! Kaffir lime I love the leaves and it’s pushing out so many fruits :)

Ok I lied! This one is for sure my last Picture! Lol this morning before going to work I actually ran by the citrus trees just to say good morning to them and I caught a little ladybug so beautiful! I’ve never actually seen such a shiny ladybug before what a beautiful and perfect ladybug On my shiranui tree!

Hi

All your trees look great.

Steve

your mites and mealybugs that cause scale are probably disappearing

Wow - these photos are so helpful and inspiring. Thank you for sharing, everyone! I have been reading a lot on this forum for about a year and I am now caring for two young citrus trees in containers. I have grown others in the ground in a tropical climate, but I am looking forward to learning how to grow indoors in zone 6 now. Cheers, everyone, and congrats on your trees!

Amy, that Jaboticaba tree should need some training. This is what I suggest: The bottom half needs to be bare, keep some strong branches. Just leaves at the end of the branches, this allows fruiting on the cleaned branches. The more stripped branches, more fruit.

Here is a picture, maybe it makes a little sense. As you can see, picking berries for 2months already, starts blooming again.

Bob, you’re truly a master gardener! I don’t think I’ve ever tried that fruit. Jan, your trees look awesome!! We are all going to be swimming in fruit come winter :)

I could be wrong but those look like cranberries

Howard those are jaboticaba trees

http://www.aspruder.com.br/index.php?produto&cod=25&grupo=2&2007042015070120

Jan, did you put something on your trees? They are gorgeous with their shiny leaves! Jan, we have been blessed with some beautiful weather here since the beginning of June . I love that! I usually spend all my evening on my patio looking at my plants loll! I didn’t receive my order from Phoenix Perrenials yet. Gary said that they will start the ship to Quebec next week! I will share picture of my trees when they will arrive! Did you order a shasta gold? Jan, what is the situation in Vancouver now? Please be safe!

Bob, how I wish that my jaboticaba looks like yours. Thank you for the advice because I was just wondering how I will fit mine in my greenhouse this year. I will definitely do some trimming this week end. Bob do you also root prune it at the same time?

I was stating what they looked to me

Amy, mine is growing in a taller container, I would use oil dry or turface, same thing. Turface last much longer but harder to find, pumice is also good, fir bark and peat. Stuff that hold water, you can’t overwater this tree, as a matter of fact, overwatering causes bloom. You need a tray, a wider one, hold more spill. You don’t need to root prune, just add more stuff with a larger container. In your care, the tree get pretty big soon enough. You set the height and width of your tree’s.

so forgive me for my ignorance

and the way I'm going it can cut down on th fertilizer and be organic

Howard, grow your lemon seedlings by any method you wish. However, if you would use a conventional fertilizer like Foliage Pro, they would do a lot better. Citrus are heavy feeders requiring more nutrition than most plants.

but they not organic

those fertilizer are not organic which I want mine tobe

Howard, like I wrote above, the fertilizers that you wish to use is up to you. I was only offering you a suggestion. Anyway best of luck to you and your lemon seedlings.

liquid fertilizer from grass clippings I very high nitrogen to the point they smell like ammonia some times

I have been enjoying everyone's posts here and as always I'm super impressed at the dedication those of you in the colder areas have growing citrus in containers. I'm lucky to be able to grow a lot of citrus in-ground but I don't have to keep such a close eye on my growing conditions. Your potted soil conditions can have huge moisture and nutrient swings in a few days yet y'all still grow some gorgeous trees, and not just trees but loaded with fruit!

I'll share some new developments in my yard. This avocado came up from a seed I tossed, with other compostables, under my kumquat tree. It came up in the fall and grew all winter and spring. Winter was so mild I only covered the avocado a couple of nights.

Another kumquat on the right and a Moro blood orange on the left

I'm soooo happy the blood orange is finally making fruit! It's loaded this year and here is a closeup.

Here is a young Peter's honey fig grown from a cutting Laura LaRosa shared a couple of years ago when she was pruning one of hers back. I'm hoping to keep training it to be a single, upright habit, unlike a Celeste in the far background which is multi-trunked and sprawled like figs typically do. Also in the far background are a bunch of mature, seed-grown Ponderosa lemons.

A scrubby, sprawly, Meyer lemon I haven't figured out how to train upward. It traded a fig tree for it and this poor Meyer had been in a pot and cut back so long it had a massive trunk for its height and no real organized upward trunk. It's producing nicely now so I'm enjoying the lemons. It's actually doing better than I expected it would in this low spot in my yard that is subject to standing water.

And lastly, not citrus but several fun plants in a 10'x10' raised planter, aloe along the left, a young Japanese plum in the center, and a bunch of edible ginger (looks like tall grass) growing around the Japanese plum. None of these are citrus but edible ginger and citrus go hand-in-hand in lots of recipes. My favorite is ginger ale. It gets about a cup of lemon juice and a half cup of grated ginger root per gallon of finished ginger ale.

Oh, Howard, citrus peels are a good source of potassium so if you have a way to compost any citrus peels, they can bee a good addition. I think there will be some cases and situations where letting citrus rot under citrus trees may invite harmful fungi to your tree but thus far, I have found that returning the pulp and peel to my citrus trees has not harmed them. My trees are outside and in-ground so I can deal with the week or so that the peels are fermented, moldy, and stinky. Other organic fertilizers I have used are rabbit, alpaca one year, horse, and chicken manure. Chicken manure needs to be composted somewhere else before you spread it around your trees. It's too high in nitrogen when it's fresh from the hen house!

John, you got a nice piece of property with beautiful tree’s. You can grow all kinds of interesting stuff there and be able to grow in the ground is a big plus.

Thanks Bob. The climate is pretty good, although I have had to do a lot of covering and uncovering some winters while my trees were small. The ground is pretty fertile I think but heavy clay so I have to dig huge holes and add organics to loosen up the soil so the roots will have a chance. Seems like no matter where we are, we have to fight something :>) I would really like to add a lime to my collection but it gets too cold here most winter for limes, specifically key limes.

I have no place to compost right now live in an apartment and it has no natural lighting all I'm using to compost any thing is a small bucket

Good job John! How I wish that I can grow my trees in ground too. Maybe, one day I will have enough and move to a warmer place!

that could be possibility

Thanks for the kind comments. It's nice to be able to grown some things in-ground but we always wish we could grow something else too! For me, it's peaches (too wet here without a lot of attention), limes (too cold), cherries (not cold enough), apples (not cold enough for most varieties). I tried blueberries but found out my lot has oyster shell in the soil, I assume from dirt brought in to level for building. Blueberries need acidic soil so they didn't do well at all. Herein comes my lazy streak. I would rather go pick berries at a local farm than build up a row of sand and organics for the blueberries on my place. I guess we all have to find a balance of time to devote to our many hobbies and hopefully we can enjoy all even if we never become a master of any!

John, when I first moved to Arkansas, I was told not too much grows here, too Much rocks and quarts. Can,t find any dirt. Did it anyway, proved them wrong.