An Addition to our Citrus Grove

An old saying that I like to repeat goes something like this:

"The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago.  The next best time is TODAY!"

So today I got busy and planted a tree.  Not just any tree, but a Ruby Red Grapefruit tree.  Slowly over the years, we've been planting different types of fruit trees.  So far (in addition to the Ruby Red Grapefruit), we have Satsuma, Tangerine, Navel Orange, peach and pear trees planted.  Our goal is to have a wide assortment of fruit trees that bear delicious fruit for us to consume and give away. The next trees we'd like to get in the ground are a lemon tree and a lime tree.  A blood orange tree would also be nice.

A friend of ours has a couple of Ruby Red Grapefruit trees planted on the south side of his barn and that keeps them protected from the north winds of winter.  He blesses us with bags of delicious grapefruit that we either cut in half and eat for breakfast or we add the juice to kombucha with a bit of grated ginger.  Talk about good!  We enjoy them so much, we thought we'd get a tree of our own. Here is the healthy little tree in a spot we picked out for it.

Here's an expanded view where you can see from left to right, a naval orange, a row of blueberry bushes, the Grapefruit tree, another row of blueberry bushes, and then a tangerine tree.  The spot where we are planting the grapefruit tree is an open spot that allows us a good view into the pasture to check on the animals.  That will be overgrown in a few years blocking the sightlines, so we'll have to either prune them or find another spot from which to view the pasture.  This was the only logical place though, since it is on the south side of the house in a protected area.  I was a little concerned about planting the different types of citrus so near one another, but learned that they are either pollinated by wind or bees and they won't cross pollinate.  In other words, your satsuma will always be a satsuma.  Your tangerine will always be a tangerine.

Our mini orchard

Ever wonder how the grapefruit got its name?  It tastes nothing like a grape.  Well, I learned that they grow in clusters and the clusters look like large yellow grapes. Growing up, I was never that crazy about eating grapefruit.  It was always kind of bitter tasting and the only way I could make them edible is to add teaspoons of sugar on top of them.  Well, my taste buds either outgrew that or the varieties have gotten much better, because these are so sweet, you'd never think about ever putting sugar on them.

We purchased the tree from a local nursery in town that Russ has worked at for several years.  The tree was originally grafted and grown at Saxon Becnel & Sons, a citrus grower from Belle Chasse, Louisiana.  Belle Chasse is way down south, below New Orleans, on the way to Venice, Louisiana. Their website says that they've been growing citrus for over 160 years.  That's pretty impressive.  I noticed that they also grow some trees in Texas, in a city not far from us appropriately named, Orange!

Ruby Red Grapefruit

So following the planting directions, we selected a high spot, dug the hole twice as big as the pot, loosened the soil beneath it, and placed the tree in the hole so that the top of the root ball was even with the level of the ground.  I sprinkled some chicken litter in the hole and watered it in good.

One downside about planting trees is that it creates one more obstacle to mow around or weed eat around, but I think the benefits of having great fruit produced right there at home outweighs any inconvenience.  You just have to be careful as you don't want the strings from your weed eater to hit the trunk of the tree as it could damage it.  I'll probably just mulch around them.

All done

One thing that I'm going to have to really learn how to do over the winter this year is pruning. Pruning has always intimidated me as I don't want to damage the tree and I don't know what I'm doing.  I've read that you want to prune the tree into a round shape and create something called scaffolding limbs and that you want to be sure to prune branches that touch the ground as that's where lots of the bug damage comes from.  I've got a lot of learning to do, but I'll put that on my to-do list.

In a few years, if all goes as planned, we'll be enjoying the fruit off of this Ruby Red Grapefruit tree.