Hello, everyone. New to the site & hoping to lean on more experienced gardeners to help me in my own gardening journey.
I purchased a Weeping Dragon Orange Tree because I wanted fruit, liked its structure and it fit my somewhat limited yard.
Upon purchase, I saw it was okay for zones 6-11, which I am 7b, but thinking about planting in-ground. Anyone have experience with one of these trees in a similar zone? I can keep it in a container, but bringing it indoors can be a chore, along with the other containers I need to fit in my space.
Also, I assumed these were edible oranges, so I’m curious about it being an ornamental tree. From my understanding, ornamental plants are generally not edible?
Thank you in advance for your knowledge!
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The Weeping Dragon is a really interesting ornamental that I was able to see for the first time yesterday. I asked the owner of Madison Citrus Nursery if they were able to try the fruit but they have not held on the plants yet.
Judging from its parents and appearance, the fruit will almost certainly be highly acidic and similar in taste to other Citranges or the trifoliate orange itself. Most 50% trifoliate orange hybrids are good enough to process for juice or preserves at least.
I think it should be a good choice for an outdoor, edible-ornamental that maintains a smaller footprint in zone 7b. I think most of these are grafted onto the dwarf rootstock, Flying Dragon.
At least in the citrus world, there is a lot of overlap between edible and ornamental, so they are not mutually exclusive. However, your personal definition of edible might vary. I consider edible as being quite literally edible, but not necessarily tasty. Then, I like to distinguish by saying eatable if something is actually worth eating.
Every hardy citrus is edible, but not all of them are eatable 
These fruit should not be consumed if you have an allergy to citrus fruit or if you are on medication which grapefruit would normally interfere with.
It seems the fruit ripen around November.
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Trifoliate Orange are often hardy to zone 5.
They take brutal winters and polar vortex and laugh them off. Check out the hardy citrus threads for more details.
Trifoliate Orange or Poncitrus trifolia contain poncrin and other strong flavonoids that give the fruit a strong bitter taste of pine.
If you like the flavors of citrus and pine you might like trifoliate orange. I do.
I find the flavor pleasant and refreshing when combined with other citrus to dilute. Most people find it unpleasant as
Also you can just pick the fruit and leave it on the table to make a room smell nice. Its required to extract any juice anyway so thats a nice benifit.
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Oh, yeah, those trifoliate oranges I was driving around with in my car smelled so good. I would just pick one up and sniff it on occasion.
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I am going to show my wife this post next time she looks at me funny for sniffing my fruit.
I told her it was normal.
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Oh, no. You said, “grapefruit!” I love grapes and I love fruit, but grapefruit…not so much. Either way, should I get any, I can share them. Plus, it’s a very pretty tree! Thanks for that information. Perhaps sometime next year, I’ll have something to report so far as “eatable.” 
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Excellent ideas. I had spruce pine tips in water for the first time this spring and enjoyed it very much. Although, it wasn’t as pleasant allowing it to sit overnight. Perhaps there’s hope!
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