Growing citrus from seed.

[Hutch68]

Hi anyone grown citrus from seed in Thailand eg oranges and lemons?

Any tips on getting the seeds to germinate?

 

 

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[Lamkyong]

sort of depends on your overall plan   are you doing for interests sake  or maybe have some land for an orchard? in answer to your question  i have tried doing this with several different varieties of citrus but without success  they either bolted or just didn't germinate

 

complete flop really       having  said that   i have bought (  local market )  some small but 1 year old saplings/trees     all doing well  at 100 bht apiece  glad i went that route

 

[Hutch68]

Just to see how they go for now, if they do ok I'll grow more maybe a small orchard. Just wanting a few tips on starting them off.

 

 

 

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[Lamkyong]

ok i suggest you get yourself some small pots plastic or otherwise  + some seedling potting compost   and hope for the best  keep out of sunlight and try to keep cool  even a few ice cubes in stead of water when hot  keep damp   not wet

[cooked]

It has taken generations of selection and care to produce the citrus fruit that we have now. In all likelihood out of a hundred seedlings, one might produce a decent fruiting tree.

[fruitman]

Why would you do that? You can buy budded/grafted citrus tree's everywhere, loads of varieties available. Those fruit much faster and will sure give you good fruit...And the tree's are cheap. I had grafted tree's for 50-200 baht and some even bloomed within a month.

[Hutch68]

Ok thanks people. After reading up a little more it does look as though it would be a waste of time.
I will look around for some trees.


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[fruitman]

Oranges and mandarins do the best up north. Pomelo will do well in more humid/wet.

 

You should try the Washington navel orange which is in Florida. If you can get a grafted/budded plant of those that would be great.

 

I grew thai washington navel but they were loaded with seeds. Better grow a nice pomelo instead but they need a lot of water.

[jak2002003]

 

How about lemons and grapefruit?  I can's seem to find lemon or grapefruit trees anywhere. 

 

One of my friends has a strange kind of lemon tree... the lemons look like the small lines you get here.. but have yellow skin and are greenish inside.. but taste exactly like the big lemons.

 

I miss eating grapefruit.... but can't stand the texture of pomelo. 

 

I have 3 varieties of lime that are doing very well... lots of fruit most years.. and the trees are growing very fest and healthy.. with no special care.. simply planted in the ground in full sun.

 

 

 

 

[howard ashoul]

I simply putted lemon seed in wet cotton wool and after few days moved it to plastic bottle cutted in half filled by soil.

 

About 1 year later the tree is about 180cm, but didn't have a single lemon yet...maybe too early? Im just keeping it at balcony, water it once a day. I dont really mind, I just like the idea of growing something without too much work. :)

 

What Im fighting with right now, is that some c*nt butterfly is eating all the leafes. It almost consumed half of the leafes... . I was never able to actually see it or kill it, but it strikes every day!

[djayz]

To the OP : most people here suggest that you simply buy plants that are already growing and/or grafted. And right they are! 

However, in one of your earlier posts you wrote that you are doing it  "Just to see how they go for now". I did the same approx. 3 yrs. ago and many of the seeds germinated and turned into fine saplings. Unfortunately I had to return to Europe for 3.5 months and my better half forgot to water the young plants while I was away... enough said. 

I've just started again approx. 1.5-2 weeks ago growing lemons, limes and oranges from seed. I've planted about 50 seeds in all and already 3 have germinated. I plan on using these as root stock and I'm going to try my hand at grafting in 2-3 years from now. Just for fun/to learn something new. 

My advice to you, for what it's worth, is to do both; buy a few plants AND try growing your own from seed. It's a great feeling to see someything grow in front of your very own eyes; to know you succeeded it growing it (yes, I know know mother nature did most of the work). Later, you can graft onto your rootstock. Another learning experience! 

I say go for it! 

I left my seeds soaking in moist kitchen paper for almost a week. Then, I planted the seeds in moist peat most mixed with rice husks (about 3:1). Water daily, but make sure it's not wet. Should be moist, but not soaking. 

Alternatively, try different approaches to growing from seed. There are loads of tutorials on youtube about exactly this topic. 

It's a great feeling to see the wee green part sticking up through the soil... 

Good luck with your experiment!

[fruitman]

I've tried all citrus i could find...lemon, lime, tahiti lime, finger lime, oranges, mandarin, pomelo, navel, seedless lime and what not. Only thing left now is fingerlime grafted on pomelo rootstock, it was a citrus cocktailtree for some years with many different citrus on 1 tree.

 

If you want an oddity make something like that and learn how to graft/bud. I have more tree's like that but not with citrus.

 

Grafted pomelo in a big pot, full sun and plenty water/food can fruit within a year easy. Same did my navel. Tahiti lime fruit in 6 weeks, the others never.

 

Full sun all day is important for citrus.

 

The butterfly larvae eating the leaves is common, the larvae come from tiny green eggs the butterflies put on the leaves EVERY DAY. It's easy to spray those eggs off though. Weaverants can also keep them at bay.

 

There are many different pomelo's, i had a red fleshed one which costs the most on markets, i prefer them above grapefruit.

 

Yuzu or Sumo or Dekapon is a japanese quality orange, very nice. I've seen grafted tree's once for 1500 baht.

 

If you're in for a project make a cocktail citrus tree starting with a nice pomelo on which you graft all the other ones. It's easyier than you might think and great to see limes growing on your pomelotree.

 

[Hutch68]

2 hours ago, djayz said:

To the OP : most people here suggest that you simply buy plants that are already growing and/or grafted. And right they are! 

However, in one of your earlier posts you wrote that you are doing it  "Just to see how they go for now". I did the same approx. 3 yrs. ago and many of the seeds germinated and turned into fine saplings. Unfortunately I had to return to Europe for 3.5 months and my better half forgot to water the young plants while I was away... enough said. 

I've just started again approx. 1.5-2 weeks ago growing lemons, limes and oranges from seed. I've planted about 50 seeds in all and already 3 have germinated. I plan on using these as root stock and I'm going to try my hand at grafting in 2-3 years from now. Just for fun/to learn something new. 

My advice to you, for what it's worth, is to do both; buy a few plants AND try growing your own from seed. It's a great feeling to see someything grow in front of your very own eyes; to know you succeeded it growing it (yes, I know know mother nature did most of the work). Later, you can graft onto your rootstock. Another learning experience! 

I say go for it! 

I left my seeds soaking in moist kitchen paper for almost a week. Then, I planted the seeds in moist peat most mixed with rice husks (about 3:1). Water daily, but make sure it's not wet. Should be moist, but not soaking. 

Alternatively, try different approaches to growing from seed. There are loads of tutorials on youtube about exactly this topic. 

It's a great feeling to see the wee green part sticking up through the soil... 

Good luck with your experiment!

Now that's the kind of reply I was looking for, time is something I have and seeds are already ordered to arrive on a certain date so I will have them and may as well plant for something to do but will also look for grafted trees.

You are correct great pleasure comes from growing things and it helps with my scitsrophrinia through growing vegies trees and taking care of animals has helped my drink problem and the want to beat peoples heads in with a wooden stick.

[Hutch68]

djays I tried grafting one of my lime trees not long ago and thought I had succeeded with 2 out of the 3 I did but they have now all died off. Have you or any other member got tips on grafting? Some photos oils be great.


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[kickstart]

We must be lucky my misses has  planted lime seeds this was 6 years ago ,and thay are now bearing fruit   and we  have had a lot of luck with Pomegranates  Thai  and  Chines, verities  the Chines ones are sweeter, we have a  7 foot Orange tree growing, that  has not done anything yet  ,no flowers. the garden is  full of custard apple trees all grown from seed.

We planted some   Kaffer  Lime  seeds  the tree is now 10-12 foot tall ,as of yet no flowers,  I had  a good Mango tree that I grew from seed ,a G-Long in Thai , but that died in a flood we had .

This subject  has come up on  TV before, and some  one said  about seed coming from  F1 stock  ,it will  grow  but not produce  any fruit ,I did wonder that about  out Kafir  Lime tree , but I suspect   the orange  tree  could be ,but, can not see our local weekly  market  selling  any F1 plant stock , that is where  we got the Pomelo trees from , now growing well and producing fruit ,but as bitter as they come , certainly not a "Tong- Dee",never thought about  growing one from seed , as  has been said  for a few  baht  you can get  a 2  foot high tree ready to plant .  

As for growing seed  the custard apples  just put the seeds in the ground and grew, same with the Pomegranates, lime seeds  grew them in pots, with our compost, of cattle  manure and  soil , and  away  they  went.

[djayz]

21 hours ago, Hutch68 said:

djays I tried grafting one of my lime trees not long ago and thought I had succeeded with 2 out of the 3 I did but they have now all died off. Have you or any other member got tips on grafting? Some photos oils be great.


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I haven't tried my hand at grafting yet, but have watched many tutorials on youtube. Here are links to some of the better tutorials (Although they graft avocados, mangos, etc. I believe the concept is all the same irrespective of the plant you're grafting): 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[rickudon]

I have grown a few citrus from seed, but most plants just stagnated when about 6-12" high and eventually died (in pots). Ironically the best 2 lime trees have come from seeds that planted themselves ......... One fruited for 3 years and was producing 20-30 fruit a month. Unfortunately killed off by 'help' from the wife ... My garden is waterlogged in wet season so planting out the young trees at ground level wasn't to successful - and most didn't thrive and fell victim to the brushcutter when no longer easy to see. Always use a big pot - small pots only good for germination.

 

The caterpillars are a pain - look for small brown ones that look like Gecko shit, Need to check every few days - as soon as you see damage  time to look really well. This has kept my current Lime tree looking healthy and should flower this year or next (now 3 years old). Seeds are fun but not really a commercial option. We have a young Custard apple about 3 years old from seed which cropped this year, really good.

[Gary A]

If the seeds germinate and grow, they will likely make good rootstock for grafting. It's hardly worth waiting several years to see what they will turn out to be. I tried it and ended up with trees that were loaded with thorns and no blossoms. buying grafted trees from the local nursery is a much safer bet. Not that you can't get lucky but that's not likely.

[shamimoto]

As a hobby I planted seeds from local oranges (mandarin) in pots. 6 of them growing very healthy. No fruit yet. Lemons plenty. [emoji4]

[Hutch68]

9 hours ago, shamimoto said:

As a hobby I planted seeds from local oranges (mandarin) in pots. 6 of them growing very healthy. No fruit yet. Lemons plenty.

From seed? I mean the lemons?

[Hutch68]

On 5/20/2017 at 8:03 PM, fruitman said:

I've tried all citrus i could find...lemon, lime, tahiti lime, finger lime, oranges, mandarin, pomelo, navel, seedless lime and what not. Only thing left now is fingerlime grafted on pomelo rootstock, it was a citrus cocktailtree for some years with many different citrus on 1 tree.

 

If you want an oddity make something like that and learn how to graft/bud. I have more tree's like that but not with citrus.

 

Grafted pomelo in a big pot, full sun and plenty water/food can fruit within a year easy. Same did my navel. Tahiti lime fruit in 6 weeks, the others never.

 

Full sun all day is important for citrus.

 

The butterfly larvae eating the leaves is common, the larvae come from tiny green eggs the butterflies put on the leaves EVERY DAY. It's easy to spray those eggs off though. Weaverants can also keep them at bay.

 

There are many different pomelo's, i had a red fleshed one which costs the most on markets, i prefer them above grapefruit.

 

Yuzu or Sumo or Dekapon is a japanese quality orange, very nice. I've seen grafted tree's once for 1500 baht.

 

If you're in for a project make a cocktail citrus tree starting with a nice pomelo on which you graft all the other ones. It's easyier than you might think and great to see limes growing on your pomelotree.

 

Fruitman, how's your finger lime tree coming on on the pomelo rootstock? How many did you graft? What graft did you use? You say you have orange and lemon trees, would you be willing to sell me some budwood cuttings from your trees? Any photos of the Finger lime?

[Rc2702]

On 20/05/2017 at 8:14 AM, Hutch68 said:

Ok thanks people. After reading up a little more it does look as though it would be a waste of time.
I will look around for some trees.


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Hi Hutch, 

 

We purchased these lemon tree cuttings 7 months ago from a guy with a lovely farm near somdet. We paid 400 baht for 29 cuttings and we then purchased 30 concrete rings which were 120 baht each. Diameter aproximately 60cm and height say 30cm.

 

They look healthy but cannot see any lemons or spec of anything lemon yet.

 

The guy had a lovely little farm though and had a fair bit going on.

 

I have nothing to do with the farm I leave that to her dad but I have the contact info for the Thai farmer we got the cuttings off. He advertises his cuttings on kaidee. Speaks no English but will be very pleased to have a picture with you on his farm I'm sure.

[khwaibah]

Meyers Lemon. Seeds are from drinking ice tea at Bob Evans in the USA.  The center 13 pots are about 5 weeks old.

 

[Hutch68]

On 9/24/2017 at 7:08 PM, Rc2702 said:

Hi Hutch, 

 

We purchased these lemon tree cuttings 7 months ago from a guy with a lovely farm near somdet. We paid 400 baht for 29 cuttings and we then purchased 30 concrete rings which were 120 baht each. Diameter aproximately 60cm and height say 30cm.

 

They look healthy but cannot see any lemons or spec of anything lemon yet.

 

The guy had a lovely little farm though and had a fair bit going on.

 

I have nothing to do with the farm I leave that to her dad but I have the contact info for the Thai farmer we got the cuttings off. He advertises his cuttings on kaidee. Speaks no English but will be very pleased to have a picture with you on his farm I'm sure.

Thanks Rc, can you send me the contact details I will go take a look.

[cooked]

On 5/21/2017 at 10:01 PM, kickstart said:

We must be lucky my misses has  planted lime seeds this was 6 years ago ,and thay are now bearing fruit   and we  have had a lot of luck with Pomegranates  Thai  and  Chines, verities  the Chines ones are sweeter, we have a  7 foot Orange tree growing, that  has not done anything yet  ,no flowers. the garden is  full of custard apple trees all grown from seed.

We planted some   Kaffer  Lime  seeds  the tree is now 10-12 foot tall ,as of yet no flowers,  I had  a good Mango tree that I grew from seed ,a G-Long in Thai , but that died in a flood we had .

This subject  has come up on  TV before, and some  one said  about seed coming from  F1 stock  ,it will  grow  but not produce  any fruit ,I did wonder that about  out Kafir  Lime tree , but I suspect   the orange  tree  could be ,but, can not see our local weekly  market  selling  any F1 plant stock , that is where  we got the Pomelo trees from , now growing well and producing fruit ,but as bitter as they come , certainly not a "Tong- Dee",never thought about  growing one from seed , as  has been said  for a few  baht  you can get  a 2  foot high tree ready to plant .  

As for growing seed  the custard apples  just put the seeds in the ground and grew, same with the Pomegranates, lime seeds  grew them in pots, with our compost, of cattle  manure and  soil , and  away  they  went.

How do you recognise a tree as being F1? I'm pretty sure the Thais won't. Seedlings growing from F1 fruits will have a tendency to resemble either the male or the female parent, nobody can be sure that they won't bear fruit, but it is sure that the desired characteristics obtained by producing a F1 hybrid (dwarf growth + large fruit for instance) will be lost. 

[rickudon]

Growing from seeds can be hit and miss. F1 hybrids are mainly used for annual veg (also used for some fish), it takes many generations to produce stable parent stocks for the hybridisation. Most fruit trees are selected varieties which are then maintained by cuttings or grafting. New varieties are produced by growing from seeds, but maybe only 1% will be as good as the parent. But it takes years to know if a plant from seed will have all the desirable qualities you want. Grafting is used to get the desired traits from 2 varieties - typically the root stock will control overall size, plus possible disease resistance, while the grafted variety will provide size and taste to the fruit.

 

Lemon can grow well from seed. Custard apple very well (only took 3 years and got a  crop of about 20 fruit for the first time this year). But generally speaking fruit trees grown from seed will take 5 or more years to mature and even when they flower, you may get no fruit (we have a mango tree in our garden, maybe 30-40 years old, flowers every year but never seen a fruit on it in 7 years). my experience of Citrus in Thailand is that most trees do not live very long, whether grown from seed or cuttings (actually air layered). My B-in-law seems to have about 10% of his trees die each year, myself only ever got one lime tree to fruiting, which it did for 3 years before dying. All other plants expired within 2  years of planting into the ground, so will keep in pots/rings in future. Mandarins have always died on me in their second year, but wife has fingers made of herbicide, she usually manages to kill most of my seedlings whenever i am away in the UK ..... latest was 2 mangosteen which i had nursed along in a pot in the shade for 2 years, she thought they needed more sun - dead in 1 month.

 

I have grown bell peppers from F1 hybrid stock. Not brilliant, but did at least as well as last 2 varieties i tried. 

[Hawaiian]

On 9/29/2017 at 11:03 PM, rickudon said:

Growing from seeds can be hit and miss. F1 hybrids are mainly used for annual veg (also used for some fish), it takes many generations to produce stable parent stocks for the hybridisation. Most fruit trees are selected varieties which are then maintained by cuttings or grafting. New varieties are produced by growing from seeds, but maybe only 1% will be as good as the parent. But it takes years to know if a plant from seed will have all the desirable qualities you want. Grafting is used to get the desired traits from 2 varieties - typically the root stock will control overall size, plus possible disease resistance, while the grafted variety will provide size and taste to the fruit.

 

Lemon can grow well from seed. Custard apple very well (only took 3 years and got a  crop of about 20 fruit for the first time this year). But generally speaking fruit trees grown from seed will take 5 or more years to mature and even when they flower, you may get no fruit (we have a mango tree in our garden, maybe 30-40 years old, flowers every year but never seen a fruit on it in 7 years). my experience of Citrus in Thailand is that most trees do not live very long, whether grown from seed or cuttings (actually air layered). My B-in-law seems to have about 10% of his trees die each year, myself only ever got one lime tree to fruiting, which it did for 3 years before dying. All other plants expired within 2  years of planting into the ground, so will keep in pots/rings in future. Mandarins have always died on me in their second year, but wife has fingers made of herbicide, she usually manages to kill most of my seedlings whenever i am away in the UK ..... latest was 2 mangosteen which i had nursed along in a pot in the shade for 2 years, she thought they needed more sun - dead in 1 month.

 

I have grown bell peppers from F1 hybrid stock. Not brilliant, but did at least as well as last 2 varieties i tried. 

About your citrus trees being short lived.  Tristeza (citrus quick decline) can be avoided by rootstock that is virus resistant.  Another killer is huanglongbing (citrus greening) which is spread by an insect.  In Thailand mandarins are highly susceptible.  One of the first signs are fruit that have green splotches.  For tristeza there usually is no warning.  The trees die overnight.

Here in Hawaii all the nurseries use rootstock known to be tristeza resistant.   So far there are no known cases of HLB (citrus greening).  Sorry about your mangosteens.  I consider them understory plants and have always provided shade even when put in the ground removing protection gradually.

[rickudon]

On 10/16/2017 at 10:14 AM, Hawaiian said:

About your citrus trees being short lived.  Tristeza (citrus quick decline) can be avoided by rootstock that is virus resistant.  Another killer is huanglongbing (citrus greening) which is spread by an insect.  In Thailand mandarins are highly susceptible.  One of the first signs are fruit that have green splotches.  For tristeza there usually is no warning.  The trees die overnight.

Here in Hawaii all the nurseries use rootstock known to be tristeza resistant.   So far there are no known cases of HLB (citrus greening).  Sorry about your mangosteens.  I consider them understory plants and have always provided shade even when put in the ground removing protection gradually.

 Thanks for that. All my own citrus were from seed, Only so far got the limes up to fruiting. You may be right about the Tristeza and Mandarins, but never got those anywhere near fruiting, only they just stopped growing when about 20-30 cm tall and slowly declined.

 

Yes, Mangosteens. I learnt first time round that even one or 2 days of full sun kills a seedling when at the 2 leaf stage. This time i got to 4 leaves .... but so slow. But at least i got them through one hot season, so know i can do that. Wife not understand it takes 5 years before Mangosteen can take the sun. Oh well, try again next year. I left an Avocado seedling with the wife in charge last month, hope it survives!

[JungleBiker]

On 18/05/2017 at 6:43 PM, cooked said:

It has taken generations of selection and care to produce the citrus fruit that we have now. In all likelihood out of a hundred seedlings, one might produce a decent fruiting tree.

We're talking apples and oranges.

What you wrote is true for apples but not oranges. 

Many kinds of citrus do grow true to type from seed.

Google these three words:

citrus polyembryonic seed

[cooked]

3 hours ago, JungleBiker said:

We're talking apples and oranges.

What you wrote is true for apples but not oranges. 

Many kinds of citrus do grow true to type from seed.

Google these three words:

citrus polyembryonic seed

Interesting. I do know that the first citrus trees were nothing like what we have today.

So you just have to find a variety that has polyembryonic seeds. I wonder why more people don't do this, they must be stupid.