Notice the right side of the tree |
A Heavy Load |
I wondered why this was occurring and leaned inside the canopy of the navel orange tree to get a closer look. Here is what I saw:
Darn it! A broken limb. Not only this one, but two more in addition. I went inside and asked Tricia if we had any strong wind. Negative ghost rider. So what caused it. Well, I'm no arborist by any means, but here is my theory. Either one or both of these events may be causing this: With all the rain we have had, the wet leaves added extra weight to the already heavily laden limbs, causing breakage. Also if you grow tomatoes, you know that after a rain, the tomatoes will grow so fast, they split their skins. Perhaps all the torrential rain caused the oranges to grow too fast and get too heavy for the limbs to support the added weight.
If you look at the pictures, the leaves are still green. In the photo immediately above, you can see that about half of the limb is still intact, allowing nutrients to continue flowing to the outer limb, even though only it's only through 50% of the limb. I liken that to someone who has a blockage in an artery. They can still function, but not at full capacity and the situation should be rectified as soon as possible.
So here's my plan. In an attempt to save the oranges, I'm going to cut a "V" shaped notch into one end of some 2 x 4's and prop the broken limbs back up. This will give some support to them and to keep the limbs from breaking off completely. I'm not sure if it will salvage the broken branch. Will it grow back together? I'm not sure. Our live oak tree did. It's a little extra work to have to do this, but the benefit of enjoying a fresh squeezed glas of orange juice this winter is well worth it.
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