There is nothing quite like freshly squeezed juice from freshly picked citrus. A great reason to grow your own.
We have a lemonade tree, which I believe is a cross between a lemon and an orange. The fruit are round, yellow, and about the size of a big lemon. Here is a picture of the tree way back in Aug ’09.
It is about twice the size now, but as it was so dark today, I could not get a nice photo of it. Anyway, I picked all of the fruit off of it today. Here is the basket that ended up being chock ‘o block of lemonade fruit.
If you take a closer look (click on the picture), you will notice that the skin looks a bit pitted. That is because this fruit tree is the favourite of very small snails, who for some reason only known to Mother Nature herself, loves to eat the skin of this fruit. This only makes little groves in the skin, and does not damage the fruit in any way. So, I choose to leave the little snails in peace, and just pick the fruit when it is ripe.
This fruit makes the best juice, as it is a little tart like a lemon, but with the sweetness of a Valencia orange.
It tastes absolutely delicious. I am so glad that the snails are only tiny!
I have space for one more citrus and was tossing up between a lime and another lemon…but this one looks interesting too. MMmmmm!
How do you take care of your citrus trees? I bought a Meyer lemon bush a few years ago and about two years ago was given a miniature orange. They are outside during the summer, indoors in the winter and I fertilize with bone and blood meal. The lemon bush has flowered several times, but never actually set fruit. The orange bush has never even bloomed. What am I doing wrong, do you have any tips for me?
Feed them with 5 in 1 soluble fertilizer (45 ml in 9 litres of water) every 2 weeks. They will thrive
Its called Power Feed
Just reading this post made my mouth water.
i grow all my citrus in pots and always get plenty of fruit. i use charlie carp and slow release fertilizer on mine
Interesting. I just planted a lemonade tree in my chook pen a couple of weeks ago. I’ve never tasted the fruit but they sounded like they’d be nice.
OH WOW! It is just heaving with fruit! What a tree. Our citrus aren’t doing so well at the moment 🙁 Perhaps I should try a pot?!
Gav why did you pick them all at once? I thought citrus lasted well on the tree so you could pick them as you wanted to eat them. (Genuine question, not being critical) And, lucky you’re an organic farmer – you wouldn’t get tuppence for them with skin like that in the supermarket (wink)!
@ Hazel. I highly recommend it. The taste is excellent.
@ Anke. I fertilize with diluted fish emulsion and a half handful of dolomite lime in Autumn, and half a cup of blood and bone in the Spring. I water them every three days, and daily in Summer. Your climate may differ.
@ BM, Kim has been drinking it like it is going out of fashion!
@ Frogdancer. It will love all of that manure, but might get upset if the chooks scratch away at the surface roots. Might pay to put a 1 metre barrier around it. (saw that tip on Gardening Australia)
@ Dad, me too, except for the slow release fertiliser.
@ Mrs Bok. They may just need some dynamic lifter and dolomite around the root zone. They should start to flower about now and it would give them a great boost.
@ Denise. Mainly because they were falling off! They were ready to pick in late June, so I thought I better get to them before the worms did!