Today when I went to go talk to the chooks, I saw my neighbour 'the garden lady' start taking plants from her car boot so I went over to say hello. Normally I score all kind of little seedlings and the like, but today was a super mega score, I got 2 lemon trees from her for nothing!!! (note my excitement with over use of exclamations) One a Myer lemon and the other a Eureka lemon. No backyard is complete without a lemon, and this is something I've been wanting for a while. They are quite sad looking all leafless and spindly. One had a huge big green lemon hanging for dear life to an arched over branch. Despite lack of leaves, they are still well at truly alive, which attests to the hardiness of citrus.
I think half the fun of these plants is they are a bit sick to start with, and I get to nurture them and bring them back to life. Sometimes however there seems to be nothing wrong with them, and it feels like I've unlocked a cheat code in my 'gardening game' so I get unlimited free plants!
So first step, remove the fruit, that means the plant can stop putting all it's energy into trying to reproduce and can concentrate on leaves and root systems. Next prune back all the spindly stuff to encourage new healthy strong growth. After that, find the perfect spot, dig a huge hole, fill it with all kind of yummy stuff, I might even take my time and fill it with rotting veg scraps from our kitchen over the next few weeks. If I do that though a very thorough dog proofing will be required. Lots of blood and bone will go into the mix as will extra trace elements, magnesium and iron chelates. Might even take some soil from the chook pens as it's full of high nitrogen chicken poo. Then plant my little babies, stand back and whatch them go crazy. Any fruit formed in the first 12 months should be removed for the same reason as before.
Quick lesson on citrus problems:
*Loosing it's leaves - not enough water. If your plant is in a pot, it doesn't take long for this to be a problem over Summer. The heat we had did a real number on my kumquat despite what I thought was regular watering.
*Green veins on leaves, the rest going yellow - iron deficient, very common in Perth's alkaline soils, use iron chelates. I use the powdered form in water that way the plant can use the nutrient faster. Or use a trace element rock mineral that has iron.
*Leaves curling - citrus leaf curl, usually cause by a fungal infection, I use eco rose to fix this, it's an organic anti fungal with no withholding period for the fruit, so you can spray then eat fruit straight away.
*Track marks all over leaves - citrus leaf miner, use a white oil/soap solution to suffocate the fuckers. Or just cut out the damages leaves from the tree and throw them in the bin.
*Wart like things on the branches - gall wasp. Cut them off, put in a plastic bag and throw in the bin.
If you treat all these problems organically as soon as you see them you'll never have to get out the 'big guns' and use anything toxic which can hurt birds, frogs or even you.
Happy Gardening!
