Hi everyone! In the late 80’s/early 90’s my Nan visited Italy and returned with a seed from a kumquat fruit she’d eaten. She grew it in a pot for a few years and later gave it as a gift to my mum and dad. It’s now enormous having been planted in the ground for easily 25 years, but has only given us fruit once around 20 years ago.
It’s now October and it’s covered in large buds, which I assume become flowers...but am not sure. Is our old tree confused?! It’s been an unusually long hot and dry summer here in the UK (I’m in Essex, UK) Could this be why? It’s really grown this year too so I do hope it’s happy
- !potatoes!
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that's not a kumquat tree, it's a loquat. I have one as well, grown from seed. they usually flower in winter and try to fruit in early spring (which will never work where I am), but this year, mine's doing the same thing, flowering early. I have some growing fruits already on mine, so I may be more protective this year to try to get mature fruit...mine's in a pot still, at about 17 years old. it does seem to take a few months to get fruit to mature.
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Oh wow, I was ID’ing the photos as loquat and never noticed the topic title said kumquat.
...PM me if you would like me to edit the topic title differently...
Look up kumquats, they are tiny citrus with thin edible sweet skin, and if your area doesn’t freeze you could definitely be growing them too. I finally bought a round fruited cultivar called “Meiwa” but I have to grow it in a container and bring inside for the winter. I believe the more familiar kumquats are elongated shaped like grapes and grape cherry tomatoes.
!potatoes! - how big is your 17 year old loquat and what kind of container do you have it in?
...PM me if you would like me to edit the topic title differently...
Look up kumquats, they are tiny citrus with thin edible sweet skin, and if your area doesn’t freeze you could definitely be growing them too. I finally bought a round fruited cultivar called “Meiwa” but I have to grow it in a container and bring inside for the winter. I believe the more familiar kumquats are elongated shaped like grapes and grape cherry tomatoes.
!potatoes! - how big is your 17 year old loquat and what kind of container do you have it in?
- !potatoes!
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it's not big, and probably horrifically potbound. caliper is about 2" at the base, and the tree is maybe 5' tall, pot and all. the pot is somewhere in the 15-18" range, both in height and width. biggest fruit is now about dime-sized!applestar wrote:!potatoes! - how big is your 17 year old loquat and what kind of container do you have it in?
the loquat is in that class of plants that I usually leave outside unless its going to get below 20F. might be a little nicer to it this year.
I’m checking ours everyday now haha it’s quite exciting seeing as I’ve never seen it flower, only just about remember the fruit as it was so long ago in my childhood!
I’ve looked online about loquats and it says not all are self fertilising. If this is correct would it be likely that ours isn’t? Or would it be down to our british weather?! Also that they can grow up to 25-30ft lol yikes!
I’ve looked online about loquats and it says not all are self fertilising. If this is correct would it be likely that ours isn’t? Or would it be down to our british weather?! Also that they can grow up to 25-30ft lol yikes!
- !potatoes!
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- Posts: 1938
- Joined: Tue Apr 14, 2009 2:13 pm
- Location: wnc - zones 6/7 line