Finally, my Kishu mandarin trees have arrived! Can’t wait until May to bring them outside. If you have tips on how to grow them indoors for now, please share. It’s cold in MD now.
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Congratulations on your Kishu mandarin! They are our top three citrus variety because the kids love them! They are on the smaller size, but pack quite a delicious punch while being very easy to peel for being so tiny haha. Definitely place them inside where they get as much sunlight as possible. Water them only when the soil are dry, they are not actively growing during this time of the year so the water evaporation won’t be much.
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Currently, I put them next to my kitchen window. There is plenty of sun there. Definitely only water if the soil is dried. I am thinking of repotting them in two weeks or so. This way they will get used to the environment before I do anything. Do you think I should wait until the spring to repot?
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Those pots look pretty big compared to the amount of foliage. And given they’re not growing you might be better to wait until spring to repot. It’s better to repot right before there will be active root growth. That way the new media isn’t setting there wet all winter.
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Yeah… I was thinking to wait until spring. Thanks!
Mine is currently covered in buds in the greenhouse having me thinking about grafting a branch of it onto some of my yard citrus. But like @fruitnut said definitely don’t up-pot them now and agreeing with @Natdcfruit Id wager you may not even need to water them until spring. But certainly not a lot of watering, once or twice until they go out. And good luck fighting the fungus gnats, whenever I took plants inside I became swarmed with them, and none of the remedies ever actually eradicated them
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Great! Now I have something else to research on.
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I already have a couple once year-old grafts of kishu (from CCPP), but today I got a big box of them from the local grocery store, and got what I believe is my second seed ever in a store-bought kishu, so I’m tempted to sprout this one. If anyone really really wants this seed, PM me, because I’m likely to kill it with neglect, but I’ll give it a go otherwise.
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What I’d really like,is some budwood,if the seed grows.
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How did your kishu fruit set look this year? My small graft has only two branches but they are both entirely covered in fruit, I’m considering thinning them a bit because it seems like too many for such a small graft, even though they are small fruit anyhow. Here’s one of the branches:
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Ton of fruit on the small tree but I think the fruit set damaged it because it mostly defoliated. It didn’t come back super lush, I will fertilize it some, I don’t want to thin the fruit because I don’t mind it being stunted. I also put a kishu graft on a rootstock I had planted so now I’ll have one in ground also.
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I’m not really worried about stunting growth, I’m more worried about the graft snapping from the weight, and also fruit size. They are so small a cultivar even in good conditions, I don’t want them too much smaller than normal.
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Those are looking good! I’d say about 4 or 5 months further along than mine? Mine flowered in June/July on my patio after not waking up until early May in my greenhouse… 
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