By James Wall
After years of nurturing my precious citrus trees, this year the trees are paying me back.
Yes, they do need regular watering, feeding and sometimes protection from horrible critters like Leaf-miner and Gall Wasp. Yes, they do grow rather slowly. Yes, Melbourne can be a little cold for some varieties.
But YES, this year I am getting loads of fruit and……..loving it.
Mandarin Japanese Seedless
This tree is only about 1.5 metres and already fruited last year. It consistently fruits in April, and the fruit are of a good size. It is my favourite citrus tree.
Mandarin Imperial
This tree has grown bigger than the Japanese Seedless and has more fruit, but the fruit are much smaller and are only starting to colour up now. On reflection I may have been wiser to give this tree a couple of liquid feeds coming out of summer to try and beef up the fruit a bit.
Its been a few years, but at last there are some thumping big oranges that have formed on this tree but they are still green at the moment. I saw this variety at a friends place down in Seaford a few years ago, and after tasting one straight off the bush, I just had to grow one at my place.
The tree is still only 1.5 metres, but it is really starting to thicken up, after about its fourth or fifth year.
It is the world’s most popular citrus as it is sweet, has a thick, easily removed rind and is nearly seedless. The fruit also breaks into segments nicely.
This variety was originally a mutant from Brazil, brought to the USA by a Presbyterian missionary. It really launched the Californian citrus industry in the late 1800s.
Lemon Meyer
This tree is a phenomenon ! It had been their many years before I moved in and has been declared one of the best lemon trees in the street. There are so many lemons all at once, that unless I bottle them, many of them will be given away at the nursery. I guess one of the advantages of Lisbon and Eureka lemons is that they spot fruit throughout the year rather than glut at once. They usually have bigger thorns though ! They are also true bitter lemons unlike the Meyer which is a cross between a lemon and a mandarin or orange. It originated in China.
Lime Kaffir
Ok, so everyone uses the double leaves for Thai, Laos and Cambodian cooking, using them like bay leaves. There is also the zest which just smells amazing. I actually like to take the weird knobbly fruit and use it for juicing – yes, thats right I am a kaffir juice sinner ! It’s not that sour, but it does make me feel rebellious !
Ok, so all I can say to budding citrus growers is be patient. At first its seem like a long haul, but when you think that these trees will fruit almost every year now for the next 2o years of so, it is a most satisfying species of tree to grow.