Anyone every done it? I have read a few posts where people have just severed the roots of a growing tree and have gotten that section to sprout. It makes sense since its propagated via cuttings. I was thinking it wouldn’t be all that bad if you treat it like any other root cutting.
Thoughts?
I’ve used a lot of Citation for nearly 30 yrs. I’ve never seen a sucker. Trees dug up don’t send up shoots from the severed roots. I like this rootstock a lot esp for pluots. But it is very suceptible to crown gall. So much so that I’ve mainly moved to other roots.
What have you used for apricots/aprium?
I’m trying K1 for everything. Have some cots now on K9. Their vigor seems about right but I couldn’t get any more last yr. I’m also using quite a bit of Lovell. It’s vigor isn’t as high as I thought so am pretty pleased with it. But didn’t find anything with known high resistance to crown gall.
Citation does give big high brix fruit and it is very compatible with everything except peach/nectarine. I’ve had much great nectarine on it but once in a while due possibly to virus infection nectarine stunts out. DWN won’t sell commercial nectarine on Citation but do retail because folks like some dwarfing.
Not compatible with peach? My best tree is on citation. I’m surprised to hear that. I like it a lot. Not a lot of suckers. So how do they propagate? Rootcuttings or something?
I’ve had two duds on my lot so far, a peach and a nectarine, both on citation. Never again. It’s been fine with pluot, plum & apricot. Its drought tolerance in general seems questionable. My pet knock on DWN is that they push citation hard on everything for the home grower. With BYOC I can control vigor with pruning – I can’t bump up vigor without a negative impact on fruit production and quality.
Getting back to the topic at hand, my preference would be to propagate a more vigorous and easily obtained rootstock, at least in my locale.
I ordered 2 peaches and a nectarine on citation last year. One died later in the summer and one barely survived. The other one did fine. They both lost their leaves late in the summer so it was not transplant shock. All the rest of the trees I ordered, including plums on citation, did fine with no low vigor problems. Like MrClint , I will not order peach or nectarine on citation again.
Here in Phoenix Citation is a dud on peaches. They massively lack vigor, im lucky to get 2-4" of growth a year when other peaches see 12-36" of growth a season. Many here have issues with Citation’s lack of drought tollerance on Apricots and Plums…I dont personally have any problems on that due to the way we deep irrigate. Its a excellent root for me on Plums and Apricots, just not Peaches.
I’ve had the same experience with peaches and nectarines on citation. I have a stark Saturn donut peach and Artic Jay nectarine that only put on 3-4" of new growth every year. The fruit quality is fine, there is just not enough of it,
Resurrecting an old thread.
Did anyone have success rooting citation? This thread contains information about Citation characteristics, but no info on propagating Citation.
I was left with a bunch of Citation cuttings after a grafting session and decided to try rooting them as an experiment.
I used a grafting knife to exposed the cambium at the end of the cuttings and dipped the exposed ends in powdered root hormone. I then stuck the cuttings in a damp seed starter medium and they’re now sitting in shade.
After almost month of shade, 2 of the 13 specimens show promise and have been moved out of shade. Other 11 specimens are still in shade and few of them I also suspect may show new growth soon.
#1 (Top): specimen doesn’t have new growth, but it never defoliated and has not wilted in afternoon sun.
#2 (Bottom): specimen has new growth (see blue arrow), but foliage is green instead of burgundy. Keeping it in dappled shade of marigolds.
