I only do 2 heavy feedings a year, in February and June.
The other stuff is just because I happen to have lots compost that I make. Plus I have the aquarium water and instead of wasting it I use that instead of pouring it down the drain.
The only thing critical is the two heavy feedings. And it is critical because they are definitely greedy plants.
My lengthy response makes it seem a lot more complicated than it is. The two main feedings in February and June are the most critical. The other stuff I do monthly merely because I make so much compost I need to use it up. And the aquarium water would be going down the drain so I’d rather not waste it. Aquarium water is very nitrogen rich. It’s basically fish toilet water. 
What I was trying to convey is that citrus are heavy feeders, so make sure you get them sufficient food for the entire growing season. If you use a time released fertilizer twice is probably fine. But if you use something that’s available immediately you’ll want to do it more often.
Makes sense thanks I’ll definitely go a little more heavy on some feeding. Wish all my trees were as easy and happy as my pomegranate’s.
Yeah, they are really easy by comparison. I have 8 different types of pomegranates and the only issue I ever had was last year when one of the so called Russian cultivars got some kind of mite. The leaves all got crinkled up on the tips of the branches. So during the winter I used dormant oil. Took care of them. No sign at all of any problem this season.
Mine are in pots using potting mix recipe from four winds growers and fed with Jacks citrus fertilizer every other week. They grow and fruit well.
sigh
I wish pomegranate were easy here. Unfortunately, there’s a fungal disease of crepe myrtle that also affects pomegranates, and man if there aren’t crepe myrtle trees in just about every yard, street, and parking lot in the South.
This last month we’ve just been swiching over to Romero 24-14-14 water soluble from Miracle Grow for our fertigation (better price). Doing a probably higher than adviseable concentration.
I’ve been dumping 3 gallons of water with a little under 1/2 cups of fert on all my new perennials (citrus, pawpaws, jujubes, peaches, fiejoas, etc). So far, I haven’t noticed any fert burns, but its made my Parfianka pomegranate have weird, crinkly looking new growth.
Wow I hope I deal with that. There’s probably a thousand different CM trees growing around 500 houses here. Some places have 3 in their yards. They’re very drought tolerant and handle everything the weather throws at them here.
I’ve also read that you can graft Pomegranate scions onto CM trees.
On the West Coast you’re probably fine.
That’s especially a bummer for you. Isn’t your growing season relatively long, typically with abundant sunshine and warm weather throughout the late summer and fall? Conditions which, of course, are perfect for ripening pomegranates. Would it make any difference to grow them under an awning, preventing moisture from encouraging the fungus? What about spraying a fungicide? Unless that’s not something you do.
Even if I never get consistent fruit from any outdoor pomegranates I will still keep growing them. I appreciate them just as much for their spring blooms and rangy habit as I do the autumn fruit. In case all else fails, I have one planted in the ground inside my greenhouse. At the very least this one should provide me with enough fruit to brighten the holiday table. Though I’m still watching the fruit on the outdoor trees with anticipation.
Do you have a pic of the leaves?
Hi I love that profile pic and also play around with some bonsai. Haven’t had a lot of luck with citrus bonsai as you could probably guess by the post lol. Is that an Air Layer?
Yeah, I’ve seen people try a lot of different things, with mixed results. It’s not impossible, but it’s hard enough that I’d put pomegranate in there with stuff like apples and stone fruit. Technically possible, and some people succeed, but it’s not something I’d judge as worth the effort for the most likely results.
There’s a pretty long thread on here started by a lady who lives about an hour north of me. She’s struggled for years and had very mixed results.
It’s just one of those things I have to accept about where I live. Technically, pomegranate, olive, pistachio, and apricots all can grow and fruit here. Am I going to attempt them? Nah, not likely.
Sorry but no…took a pic of pretty much everything except that.
May be able to get pic a decent pic in a few weeks, but not now. Just cut a low res one out of the backround from another pic I had:
You can almost make it out, on the new
red part you don’t see any nice, larger leaves sticking out.
Hold up, you just broke my brain. Apples are tough to grow in North Carolina?
That really surprises me. Even where I grew up in the Southern California desert my dad was able to plant an apple tree that was always loaded with fruit around harvest time. We were 90 miles southeast of Los Angeles, on the dry side of the San Gorgonio pass. Out there with the chollas and creosotes, chill hours were hard to come by some years. Fortunately, the Coachella Valley Water District had a program to provide residents with the appropriate specimens for our climate. The apples they recommended were just so so, while the desert gold peaches and nectarines were outstanding.
So what factor(s) makes apples a tough go in your area?
Obviously, trees like apples and stone fruits are tough to grow in greenhouse culture. Makes sense that you wouldn’t put in the effort. On the other hand, pomegranates, work really well in a greenhouse. You can keep them rather compact, roughly 6 feet tall with 3 trunks, and still get some nice yields. Of course that’s assuming a person has the greenhouse and sufficiently likes the fruit enough to put in the effort. I don’t rate pomegranates on the same level as citrus, but I really enjoy the juice.
Late frosts, deer, squirrels, bluejays, Japanese beetles, fruit maggots, various other bugs, and a list of diseases longer than Moby Dick.
Not that it’s impossible, but it’s a lot of work if you want consistent harvests of apples that are is acceptable quality. They do actually grow some commercially in my state, but up in the mountains not down here on the coastal plain.
There’s just a really mind-blowing amount of pest pressure here. Even plants that most consider pest free, like jujube, figs, passion fruit, and persimmons, I’ve had more then a few issues with. Those at least a still worth growing though, because the pests are manageable. For apples? Nah, not worth the time and money.
LOL. My California gardener friends live life on easy mode. The lack of humidity means very little fungal issues. It’s literally “Just add water!”. Now where the water is coming from…that’s a California problem, but the growing of the fruit seems so much easier. Out East, we have adequate rainfall most times, but we get scab, black rot, fireblight every minute due to the humidity.
I guess the gardening is always greener on the other side from where you stand…
True that!
While there are a handful of places that really do have just about perfect climate for gardening (the wetter parts of southeast Australia, some areas in western Europe, coastal hill country in southern Brazil, high altitude Hawaii, etc.), the vast majority of places are just about comparative advantages and disadvantages that, mostly, balance out. Sure, some places are just terrible no matter what (cold drylands out West, boreal forest zones in Maine, Canada, etc.), but they’re a minority.
I can be jealous of ultra low pest California, or laugh in 60 inches of rain and no black fig fly. And I actually can afford a few dozen acres here, maybe a hundred if I don’t mind being further away from town. Sure, Seattle folks can grow Chilean myrtle and Araucaria aruricana, but I can grow passion fruit and Araucaria angustifolia, and my citrus actually ripen on time, ha!
All that being said, folks in Western European and Midwest American climates do massively benefit from a few thousand years is breeding with in their climates.
Aside from a few Asian cultivars, I don’t quite have that legacy to leverage. Hence why I’m breeding my own stuff…
Plants adapted to hot, humid, low latitude climates can absolutely out produce any other plant in milder, lower pest zones (e.g. the South produces more timber than any similar sized region on earth save for Brazil). But there just hasn’t been enough work on those plants generally, especially for fruit (plenty of great sweet potato cultivars though). Citrus is probably the lowest hanging fruit, so to speak, here. A bit more cold hardiness, and we’ll be all set.
Ah, pest pressure! That makes more sense. Brain fixed.
Apples are one of those things that are nice and all, but don’t rank really high on the totem pole for me. I grow a few trees, but mainly just for tinkering with grafts and practicing extreme pruning techniques. There are other fruits that I prefer growing.
