re: Louisiana Tropical Fruit Gardening - Experiences and Updates

Any sense in removing the panicles once it sets fruit and waiting for another round of flowering closer to spring?

quote:

---

I’m seeing new flushes coming from CAC, Mahachanok and it looks like Angie plus Pickering may give me another flush too:

---

I'm jealous. My pickerings, nam doc mai, and M-4 are all stagnant. Just gave them a sprinkle of osmocote this morning.

quote:

---

I'm jealous. My pickerings, nam doc mai, and M-4 are all stagnant. Just gave them a sprinkle of osmocote this morning.

---

This year has been very odd. The lack of tropical storms has us way below the usual rainfall totals. We’re 15 inches behind the historical averages and it shows. It’s dry as hell. Which is a bit worrisome because now is when we normally get into the real dry period that lasts from December to March. So we could go a full 6-7 months without much meaningful rainfall. I don’t see how the mango trees will thrive next year if that’s the case.

Then we got a freeze in early November which is a full month early. I ended up with some burned leaves on the mangos and avocados. This NDM kicked into bloom way too early as a result. I generally don’t see much flushing here after October. Yet; here we are with some trees pushing new growth.

Like I said; it’s all wacky this year. Fingers crossed that it all works out,

I’ve got a little seedling experiment going too. I grabbed up some Improved Solo Sunrise F1 Papaya seeds I’m trying to germinate.

It’s supposedly an improved high yield Solo Sunrise fruit. The fruits are larger on average than the Original Solo Sunrise. They also claim to have bred out the nasturtium profile which gives the vomit-like flavors found in some papaya varieties. We’ll see….

If anyone wants seeds; I’ve got plenty and will happily mail you some.



Outside of that; got my onion sets planted yesterday. Co-planted some into my strawberry plants which are on the struggle bus; I planted them right before the freeze and it really set them back.

Finally dug my inkbird thermostat out of the attic. Surprised it still works after 4 or 5 summers up there. Crazy how fast that lil heater gets the greenhouse to temp.

Yeah man. A little $30 space heater is all it takes to grow mangos and such in Louisiana. Wish I had known this 10 years ago.

Very nice. Glad it's finally doing its thing!

Yep unlike oranges and mandarins, lemons and limes do not have a "season." If the climate is warm enough they flower and set fruit year round. My greenhouse key lime is flowering again right now and I often get off season lemons in warm years. Congrats!

The black on the leaves looks like a whitefly infestation. They leave a residue on the leaves which sooty mold. It might be the same causing what is on the buds but I don't think I've ever seen that on mine. I've been fighting whiteflies for two years on my citrus and haven't been able to get rid of them completely.

Loup and cgrand are spot on. You've got sooty mold from citrus white flies. You can tell by the black residue on the leaves.

The stuff on the buds is likely aphids.

I get both of these every year on my Meyer and on no other citrus. Meyer is insanely pest prone. The aphids are easy. I find pyrethrin spray knocks them right out. The white flies are a much more stubborn problem. Neem is garbage and only works if you mix it to like quadruple strength with a surfactant and spray every single inch of every single leaf and branch about 3 days per week from April - November. I don't play that bullshite.

I handle white flies like this. Since Meyers are one of the first things to flush new growth for me in the spring, I spray once or twice per week with AzaMax. This is a super concentrated distillation of azadirachtin, the active ingredient in neem. You can spray this at dusk and avoid harm to pollinators. If you keep this up, you can keep the white flies down enough to prevent new mold. I rotate this with spinosad and pyrethrin every week or so. You should also do a copper spray every week or two to kill the existing mold and prevent new mold. But as the rest of my orchard/garden/collection/whatever comes online, I always end up leaving the Meyer to the white flies. It's a losing battle here. In December after the first good freeze, I spray the tree down with copper and then blast as much of the mold off as possible with a hose. Then you are good until the cycle starts again in spring. I spray my Meyer more than any other tree by far, including even stone fruit.

Your tree is small and potted. I bet you can control it with AzaMax and a hand spray bottle. I would also wipe off every leaf just for cosmetic purposes because I hate looking at sooty mold.

Every day I wonder why the hell I planted a Meyer lemon in the best spot in my yard. You can't eat them. They aren't very cold tolerant. Insanely pesty. Totally random untidy growth habit that shoots awkward branches everywhere. Needs massive yearly pruning. The only benefit I get is it's pretty for a few months per year and and everyone oohs and ahhs when they see something more exotic than a satsuma or navel orange. I wonder what on earth people are doing with the hundreds of lemons I give away.

Wish I had put a cara cara navel in this spot instead or even a guava or something since I already have to protect the Meyer from freezes.