anyone have any in their garden?
This year we decided to plant a couple of apple trees and then potted a banana, orange and lemon. They are doing very well, except the lemon. I think it is dying (
It's great watching them already growing and sprouting. The banana changes every day! However, I am at a loss on how to help the lemon tree. I've done research on the internet to see what is wrong and see if I can help but nothing is working. So, anyone with a lemon tree - did you plant it yourself? What do you know about them.
Apparently we have to wait a year for any oranges to be ripe, even with the tree flowering this year! I can't wait grin
Oh, also, we planted a raspberry cane and grape. we are going to have to move the grape because it isn't get enough sun but both are growing.
Hi Ben, you don't say whether this is a miniature lemon or a standard you're just retarding until you decide where to put it.
I have a Meyer lemon, now in the front yard, which was in a pot until 3 years ago. It never did much and looked a bit seedy and droopy. I put it in the ground as a last resort thinking it would keel over and die. It would have none of it, it immediately produced thorny sports and the best crop of lemons ever. Of course with the 29 days below freezing we had to strip the fruit after about 3 days when it started to brown and I gave everyone lemons. Even Second Harvest.
In the backyard I have a lemon, lime and orange standard, they went in the same year as the Meyer but they were new. I was replacing Oleander, the old fashioned double petalled fragrant ones, they got a virus which made them weep, I blame the council spraying for fruit fly, kills the fruit fly, weakens the defense systems of old varieties.
Anyway, my neighbour, who's been here forever and a day, explained that when the area was olive orchard and fruit orchards they would water in the fruit trees for the first few years, really water them, a can a day each and feed them every other week, the hard top here is clay you can make bricks out of and it takes them 3 years to get the root thru the hard top, but, at the same time they need leaves and top and wot not. So he advised feeding and I went to Costco/Sams and got me some of that liquid/powder feed and I do that, once a week and make sure they're always moist below the surface. It's working. We now have lush leaf growth, but not much in the way of fruiting yet.
The lime keeps pulling up it's roots, I swear the buggers trying to walk, and I have to keep piling earth over it's roots.
Try it on feed and keeping the roots damp, if that doesn't work, dig a hole and let it fend for itself. Citrus appears to like to be in the earth.
Can we have pics of the banana tree, that sounds fun, I never thought of one.
Oh, and we have two fig trees too. One in the front yard which I bought, and one in the backyard, next to the cold frame, and between the potters wheel and frame. A testament to my laziness. Never throw away the end of fruit in California, by the time you realise it's a tree it'll have 3 years worth of roots beneath it and it's not gonna come out for anything.
The B-E garden is fruity enough!!
Thanks Annie.
With us living in the north of the US, it is a dwarf lemon that has to stay in a pot because we have to bring it inside in October for the winter.
I stopped watering so much because I read that they don't like too much water but nothing is happening. so I'll start watering again. It came fed so we didn't add any extra feed except for the compost that we planted it in. So I'll try feeding itas well. The orange tree seemed the same way for a while then all of a sudden we got buds appearing. I presume we will need to thin the buds out? There are quite a few.
I'll try and take a photo of the banana this week and post it up. It is still quite tiny - it really was like a little baby when we got it a month ish ago. )
Ben, do you have an Orchard hardware store over there. They do a Lilly and Miller Citrus and avocado fertilizer. You have to be a bit on the sparing side with it but it works. Hope this helps.
Oh by the way wet citrus leaves in sunshine brown really quickly and make the tree look scraggy, so water before the sun hits or in the evening.
I have a forty five year old apple tree in my back yard. It got hit in a storm last year so now it's only half an apple tree. Used the chopped up branches in landscaping (too bloody heavy to haul away) It's still huge though, back in those days they never did dwarf varieties of anything. Produces a bumper crop every other year, this year is looking good. Apparently if you want your apple tree to produce apples every year you need to do some sort of pruning - look on the web. Now is the best time to know about these things when your trees are young.
It's very difficult to be a gardener in the mountain west. Am trying to grow some clematis this year, doing well so far but I don't know if they will survive the winter.
Good luck with your trees.
My wife's Grandparents have lots of apple and peach trees. The peaches are especially wonderful.
My wife's Grandparents have lots of apple and peach trees. The peaches are especially wonderful.
I was thinking about a peach tree also but wasn't sure if it would create a wasp problem like plums do. Had a plum tree in Nottingham and it was the wasps favorite place :roll:
Dianey we had an apple tree in nottingham and we used to get bumper crops every other year too. In order for us to get apples every year we would have had to take out every other apple at least in each bunch. It is recommended that you 'thin' the crop to get a good crop each year. But we found we still got apples on the other year and with us having a plum tree as well it worked out that the plum and apple gave bumper crops in different years so we didn't care. I can't imagine it was a fully grown tree or must have been a type of dwarf because we could reach the top without too much of an effore - just a step ladder next to the tree was enough to get all the apples.
Annie - thank you so much for your suggestions. we tried them and we now have growth on the lemon tree, AND a couple of lemons growing! D
The poor thing still looks a little sorry for itself but it looks like it will recover.
Now, apart from the fruit trees, we also decided this year to grow different veggies. we are chuffed to bits with how well the beans and sweetcorn are doing. We have grown peppers and tomatoes before and they are easy. But now we have found that sweetcorn is so easy to grow and the wild rabbits love it! lol
Dont have any friut trees on the property and there isnt much room to plant any.
.we have 9 now planted by the previous owner most of which are live oaks and shade trees .