I just bought my first citrus trees, a meyer lemon and marumi kumquat, from tyty. The kumquat is about 2 ft tall and the lemon is about 3 ft tall. I planted them in 15 gal containers with a mixture of 3 pt pine bark/mulch, 1 pt sand, and 1 pt peat. I watered them lightly and set them in my sun room. The kumquat's leaves have a yellow edge, and I haven't figured out if it is a mineral problem or what. Because these are my first trees, I was just wondering if anyone would have done things differently. (ex. smaller pot, different substrate, etc.)

Hmmmm. Maybe bought my plants elsewhere... Mabe you work for tyty ? This is without saying about the worst place to purchase anything....

Believe me, Laaz know what he is talking abnout. I do not know of a single person that has been satsified with purchased from TYTY.

If you received good trees from Tyty then consider yourself to be lucky! They are without a doubt the worst scoundrels I've ever heard of in the nursery trade.

As for your containers they sound rather oversized to me for the size of trees you state. I'd use pots in the three to five gallon range. Four parts medium sized pine bark nuggets to one part sphagnum peat is what I used to use. I'd leave out the sand. As soon as your last frost date has past I'd move them outside.

.....Alan.

In my opinion TYTY is the worst possible place to purchase ?? living ?? plants. You better check to be sure they are actually citrus. As Alan remarked in the post above, your trees are planted in too large of a container. Your trees will get into trouble. You need to plant them into either a 3-gallon or certainly no bigger than a 5 gallon container. - Millet

Bamaquat, what zone or state are you located?

Yellow tips on the kumquat are probably a sign of zinc deficiency.

I have never ordered any type of plant through the mail and I had no idea tyty had given people so many problems. I just noticed them because they advertise so much. My lemon tree seems to be very healthy and is blooming. I am very happy with it. However, I am a little disappointed in my kumquat tree. I should take some pictures and upload them. If I were to order any more plants in the future, what would be a good business or company to use?

I am from northeast alabama and am located in zone 8.

They do advertise a lot, this is true.

Post your tree pictures and I'm sure someone will be able to make suggestions. I'm afraid I can't suggest any sources right now as Florida is under a citrus quarantine for the most part. We have lots of other folks though that order from other states who might be able to suggest suppliers.

.....Alan.

I am really beginning to doubt about most people's diagnosis of kumquats and related fortunella cultivars and their hybrids considering that these occur during the cold season.

Now that I got your attention, try to recall accurately your own observations of citruses planted in zone 9. ALL those that are planted inground in Zone 9, including mine, have shown some splotches of yellowing similar to various nurients defficiency EVERY COLD SEASON EVERY YEAR even though they are planted side by side or within close proximity of Oranges, Mandarins, Grapefruits that have NO SIGN of deficiencies, meaning, these are grown in the same soil with sufficient nutrients. I believe the symptoms has A LOT to do with the temperature rather than nutrient deficiencies.

The fortunellas are cold hardy types, and the most common yellowing of the tips are similar to Zinc deficiency. Practically all kumquat types that I have seen have these symptoms going into winter and early spring. It could be this group's characteristic and has nothing to do with nutrient deficiency. It could be an adaptive response, and I don't think doing something about its condition during the cold season will improve the performance of these cultivars.

When the days get warmer and soil temperature rises, the symptoms magically disappear without me doing anything special aside from the normal fertilizer application as scheduled.

Not so with mine Joe-- I will post a picture, but my Miewa is completely green. It used to have yellow tips, but after I started using the trace mineral mix and fertilizer with trace minerals, the yellow tips disappeared.

My sister Vicki's miewa has yellow tips now, but I just applied some of the trace mineral mix and gave her some fertilizer with trace elements--we will see if the yellow tips disappear next winter.

Skeet, how many frosty nights did you have, how many nights below freezing and how low did you go when it comes to temperature?

Here in the inland Sacramento Valley, we all have those deficiency symptoms even if we apply trace elements and other nutrients into the soil. There's a way to correct that for sure, foliar sprays with trace minerals and chelates can be applied during warm days of winter, and they immediately respond. But it doesn't increase size of fruits nor the yield. But it can make your plants prettier and most people would want the pretty part much more than the fruits.

The yellowing and other splotches indicates nutrient uptake and metabolic imbalances. Perhaps the fortunella types continue their slow growth and depletes the stored nutrients in the tree and the rootstocks may be dormant to replenish needed nutrients.

In the case of satsumas and oranges that go almost dormant along with the rootstock, they remain dark green.