care and health maint for fruit trees

[keakar]

I have a Satsuma tree going on 3 years in the ground and a manderine tree going on 2 years in the ground and about 4 ft tall spaced 10-12 ft apart and both made it thru the freeze ok. the Satsuma looks like nothing happened to it but the manderine tree dropped all its leaves but all the small branches are still green. I want to give them some TLC and speed up how fast they grow and get stronger.

what is the best way to care for them and ensure they get big ands healthy as quick as possible to make larger sweeter fruit?

I just don't know if im supposed to just leave them alone or try to give them tree food or fertilizer and such.

every few weeks I spray them with soapy water to keep the bugs away and I have removed the fruit every year so far because I was told it helps the trees get a better root system established if its not having to develop the fruit.

any advice is greatly appreciated, thank you

[flounderpounder]

LSU ag has a great guide for citrus tree care and maintenance in LA. It cover fertilizing schedules. https://www.lsuagcenter.com/en/commu...Production.htm

You will get differing opinions on covering vs not covering during frost. I follow the survival of the fittest method.

[Gerald]

I have had fruit trees for 15 years now. Here is what I do.

After it warms up in the spring.....maybe this coming week.....I will fertilize with 13-13-13. My trees are big and well established, so they need more "food" than younger trees.

For your 2- 3 year old trees, I would put 2 cups [maybe up to 4 cups depending on the size of the tree] around the outer edge [drip line]. This should be done in a week or two from now.

Some time in May or early June, I fertilize again with about 1/2 the amount of the first fertilizing. No more fertilizing after June.

Watering is critical during the spring and early summer. If the plants get too dry when the fruit is very small, the plant will "drop" a lot more fruit than normal.

Spraying with soapy water is probably not necessary, but some spraying to kill bugs maybe required.

This year, I would not pull all the fruit off the tree. Pull the smaller size fruit and leave some of the bigger ones. Next spring.....leave all fruit, the plant will drop the small weaker fruit.

We love the taste of the manderine fruit.....I have 2 trees, but this past year both trees [in different areas of my yard] did not produce good tasting fruit. The fruit was soft ball in size, thick skinned and did not taste very good. Don't know why this happened after ~12 years of great fruit.

I have had just the opposite experience with my Satsuma plant. It always produced a "soft ball" size fruit that had a very thick skin and not much taste. Many many times I almost cut the tree down to get rid of it. Then this year, the plant was loaded very good fruit that was a lot smaller in size.


My lemon and Orange trees took a big hit in the freezing weather this winter. All leaves are brown. Lemon tree may not produce any fruit this year or next year. Not sure what I will do to both of these trees. Probably will have to cut them down to 1/2 there size and see what happens. I will wait 4- 6 weeks to see if the plant starts to grow back on its own. The Lemon tree is ~ 15' tall.

[DannyI]

My lemon tree lost all leaves also, but gonna leave it be for a few weeks. Had that happen couple years back from freeze, didn't produce as many lemons that year, but loaded following year. La. sweet orange is doing fantastic, and the fruit this past season was best fasting ever.

[Cappy]

WE have lemon, satsuma, grapefruit, orange and lime. What the county agent told us for our yard is 1 lb of 13-13-13 for every year the tree is old. We kinda go by how big the circle of the drip line is. We have found a great way to fertilize is to punch a hole at the drip line with a recking bar. wallow out a hole and poor in 1 lb of fertilizer that happens to be a red solo cup full. if the tree is small we punch 2 holes oposite each other. If its large it gets as many as 10 holes around its drip line a couple paces apart. We will be doing this next week or later, Febuary is the recomended month for fertilizing and pruning. As mentioned Lsuagg is a great sorse. Dan Gill has a link to his site and he is louisiana's garden guru.
When we get around to doing this I'll post a few pics and the link. Our beloved lemon monster lost all its leaves and seems to be headed for the grove. It's 12 years old and we get 10 to 16 gallons from it every year so it will be greatly missed. One satsuma died so we are starting another now 2 years old we been covering it every freeze but it dont look good either. We love playing in our yard but I gotta warn ya it aint all goy ya loose things and in a WAY THAT MAKES THE FRUITS OF YOUR EFFORT ALL THE MORE REWARDING. Here is a video we made of harvesting olur beloved lemon monster, I sure hope it pulls through, but if not we will start over and look forwards to doing it again.

Taming the Lemon Monster 2013 - YouTube

Taming the Lemon Monster 2013 - YouTube

[keakar]

ok so its not necessarily a thing where you put x amount of this stuff and it makes sweet fruit, its more of tree food to be healthy ands its pot luck weather you have big or small or sweet or not fruit?

so if I need to "feed it" every year, where do you guys find has the best price on tree food?

as for spraying the soapy water I had bugs eating the leaves so that's why I started doing that and the white fuzzy stuff on it was from some tiny little bugs making a white fuzz secretion under the leaves looking like dried milk and they were eating the leaf stems while the other bugs like lady bugs and such were chewing on the leaves down to nothing.

both my trees are small and young so the Satsuma is around 30" around and the mardarine hasn't branched out yet so its only like 18" around and kinda Christmas tree looking. they were both around 24-30" tall when planted in the ground.

[Gerald]

Some of my late season picking before a freeze. 75 lemons per 5 gal bucket.

.

[PaulMyers]

Originally Posted by Gerald

Some of my late season picking before a freeze. 75 lemons per 5 gal bucket.

.

:thumbup:

[keakar]

das a whole lotta lemonade lol, what else is that in the wheel barrel?
looks like oranges and grapefruit?

[Gerald]

Originally Posted by keakar

das a whole lotta lemonade lol, what else is that in the wheel barrel?
looks like oranges and grapefruit?

Correct.....and a few manderines in wheelbarrow.

[DannyI]

My lemon tree is a Myers, about 8 years old, and I get ave 16-20 5 gallon buckets of lemons each year. We juice some & freeze, slice some and freeze (just like fresh when you take them out), and then try to give the rest away. Had 12 5gal buckets to give away this year, picked them, put them under carport and told people to come get um. Nooooooo, they want you to bring them to them. Ha, if they can't come getum, they won't getum, unless they special to us.

[eman]

Just a heads up for anyone growing satsumas. Mulch around the base of the tree to keep weeds down. We had 2 trees and would get 1000 + fruit off of them. I was weed eating around the trees . nicked the trunk of one tree . maybe 1" shallow cut. By the end of the year that tree was dead. Did some research and found out that the lower trunks are very fragile.

[speck-chaser]

Originally Posted by eman

Just a heads up for anyone growing satsumas. Mulch around the base of the tree to keep weeds down. We had 2 trees and would get 1000 + fruit off of them. I was weed eating around the trees . nicked the trunk of one tree . maybe 1" shallow cut. By the end of the year that tree was dead. Did some research and found out that the lower trunks are very fragile.

Yep, hafta be very careful with them weedeaters. The (sap stream) life of the tree is right under the bark layer.

[keakar]

Originally Posted by DannyI

My lemon tree is a Myers, about 8 years old, and I get ave 16-20 5 gallon buckets of lemons each year. We juice some & freeze, slice some and freeze (just like fresh when you take them out), and then try to give the rest away. Had 12 5gal buckets to give away this year, picked them, put them under carport and told people to come get um. Nooooooo, they want you to bring them to them. Ha, if they can't come getum, they won't getum, unless they special to us.

I know what you mean, my dad gives shallots to about 7 family members and a few neighbors and they never have time to help pick and cut them but they sure want them a few days later when they know they can get a bag of dem in da freezer dats already cut up and bagged for em.

he don't mind much cuz how much can one houshold use, so it gives him something to do like cutting the grass but he does give em a sideways glance when they start with the baloney excuses why they couldnt find the time to pick their own and cut em up themselves.

Originally Posted by speck-chaser

Yep, hafta be very careful with them weedeaters. The (sap stream) life of the tree is right under the bark layer.

gonna have to do something with mine because I regularly get within an inch of them with the lawn mower and lightly skinned them a few times last summer. I didn't realize a small knick could hurt them that bad.

im no gardener so whats the best mulch to get and how much do i put around them 1-2" or 3- 4" or just make a big mound using the whole bag?

and should I get down and peel away all the grass and grass roots I can first of just dump the mulch on top and pull anything that pops up?

[eman]

I use cypress mulch and have my tree planted i a raised bed. Best thing i have seen is a 1 foot piece of 6" pvc pipe split longways .Put both halves around the trunk and hold together w/ small bunjie cord or tape. doesn't hurt to hit the pipe.

[Gerald]

Originally Posted by eman

I use cypress mulch and have my tree planted i a raised bed. Best thing i have seen is a 1 foot piece of 6" pvc pipe split longways .Put both halves around the trunk and hold together w/ small bunjie cord or tape. doesn't hurt to hit the pipe.

OR.....cut both ends off of a soup can, then cut the metal length ways. Now put the can around the trunk of the fruit tree to protect it.

[keakar]

ok I got a big bag of the 13-13-13 but I didn't see any tree spikes, in fact they had no section of anything for fruit trees just a few things for shrubs and bushes, wallyworld sucks lol.

[Cappy]

Hang in there I am going get a sack in the morning and plan to make a post about how we do it. We have a home made hole puncher from an old tractor axle with a cross piece to step on. A wrecking bar will work too. We punch a hole and fill it up with a solo cup; of 13 13 13 and that's right at a lb.get a cup fill it up weigh it mark a lb off with a sharpie. Poor it in holes and place holes at drip line. We were told this is much better than just pooring it on ground it makes like time release columns of fertilizer. Small trees maybe 2 holes couple year old trees 4 holes at 90 degrees around the drip line. Full grown like our lemon monster, we put 10 to 12 holes walking around the drip line punching a hole every 2 steps. Our county agent recomended this to us and we been doing it for like 10 years and always have great crops from our trees. February is the recomended month for this and pruning and Lord willing we gonna be doing both tomorrow.

[Cappy]

Oh, to back up what eman said do NOT weed eat around any fruit trees. There bark is very soft and you can kill or damage the trees badly by ringing them with weed eaters. the string snicks the bark and they can easily be killed. That goes for all fruit trees. Citrus plum, fig etc. Gotta be very careful.

[BuckingFastard]

dont ever put weed and feed anywhere near anything. itll kill it all.. every time.