Question Yellowing Citris Seedling

Jarrett

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Over the winter I planted 6 seeds into pots, sadly only 3 have made it to this day. But I have run into a problem with all three of them. One is very shriveled, and light green. The second one is larger, but it is a lighter color and one of the leave's tips is dieing. The last one, and most promising it a darker larger plant, but the leaves are slowly turning bright on the tips. Here are pictures of the three.
 
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ClissAT

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Nitrogen deficiency most likely but general trace element deficiency for sure.
Probably due to inferior potting mix or too much water & too little heat or both.

Also, citrus seeds are not good performers.
The Citrus plants you by are grafted onto root stock.
The seeds are not good carriers of their parents' genes.
These days this is done on purpose of course but also because citrus require specific growing conditions & need a very strong root system to tolerate a variety of soil types & environments.
It is likely you will get a thorny, slow developing tree that probably wont fruit very well if at all.
And if it does fruit it may well be bitter lemon type fruits with tuff skins.
So, rather a waste of good potting mix, fertilizer & a lot of time.

The exception would be the Bush Lemon & maybe the lime which is a very hardy, true to type tree (& also the Aussie finger lime which is also true to type)but the lemon is not a very nice tree or fruit in anycase.
It's roots are widely used as root stock for most citrus sold in Australia.
Not sure about overseas citrus but its a similar story worldwide.
 

Flatland

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I am no expert but I was told yellow citrus leaves was either magnesium or iron deficiency so when my citrus trees had yellow leaves I mixed up a spray of iron chelates & Epsom salts & sprayed the leaves. It definitely helped my trees. Also I have found that when my trees put on a growth spurt the new leaves are lighter but darken up as they get older.
 

ClissAT

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I am no expert but I was told yellow citrus leaves was either magnesium or iron deficiency so when my citrus trees had yellow leaves I mixed up a spray of iron chelates & Epsom salts & sprayed the leaves. It definitely helped my trees. Also I have found that when my trees put on a growth spurt the new leaves are lighter but darken up as they get older.


Yes Flatland you are quite correct on that assumption. Trace elements are very important.
The old fix as we have discussed before is to pee on them.
 

Flatland

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I've been told that man pee is better than girl pee. Don't know if that is true or just a male ego thing
 

Ash

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As far as I know, there is no real difference between girl wee and boy wee given the same diet and lifestyle. But I guess therein lies the difference if diet and lifestyle were significantly different. Also, one sure way of having nutrient dense wee is to take multivitamins. The vast majority of all absorbed micronutrients from multivitamins are peed out since the body doesn't need much supplementation (the average Australian diet is actually quite wholesome). I wouldn't be sure though that peeing the vitamins and minerals wouldn't poison the plants with too much of a good thing...
 

Mark

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@Jarrett how much sun are they getting? I think they need more sun and some more citrus fertiliser with a general dose of trace elements.

Often plants will grow well initially from seed and then if they start failing it's usually due to depleted nutrients, too big for the container, over-watering, or a lack of food + trace elements.
 

DivingTemptress

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Hi,
I would really like a variety of finger lime fruit colors. Do you recommend growing from seed ? or possibly getting seedling started and then graft onto better root stock ?

I appreciate your input.

Happy Gardening !
P J, the Dirt Diva
 

ClissAT

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The newer varieties of finger limes that are coloured are all created in labs or from crossbreeding.
So starting from seed won't help.
Maybe you will fluke a pale version from seed if you have 7yrs to wait for the fruit.
If you want a certain colour, buy the plant already established that will give you that colour.
It will have been grafted from a mature tree guaranteed to give that colour fruit from the first year you own it.
 
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