Randy Smiths backyard is filled with orange, lemon, mandarin and other citrus trees. Some of them have roots that go
back to the 1950s. They were hit by a killing frost in 1972 but came back to life after new growth was grafted onto the
original rootstock.
http://www.redding.com/news/2009/jan/10/even-death-doesnt-keep-redding-orange-grove-down/
Even death doesn't keep Redding orange grove down
By Laura Christman (Contact)
Saturday, January 10, 2009
Want to juice up your garden?
Randy Smith likes to say that a citrus tree is often smarter than the person growing it.
He's certainly learned plenty from the citrus trees at his Redding home. And one big lesson was this: Just because a tree is dead is no reason to give up on it.
Smith's backyard citrus grove has an interesting history. It's a tale of death, rebirth, friendship and great orange juice. Smith and his wife, Judy, moved to their home on the west side of Redding in 1974. They didn't realize it included a grove of 26 orange trees on a slope just beyond the edge of the backyard.
"It was just an overgrown mess down there," Smith recalled.
Most of the citrus trees were dead, killed by a hard freeze that hammered California in December 1972. Only four of the trees survived.
"They were just sticks without leaves," Smith said.
That was Smith's introduction to citrus - a mostly dead orchard tangled in weeds. He's learned a lot since then - about his grove and about citrus trees in general.
The backyard grove was planted in the early 1950s by the home's original owners, Wally and Margaret Baker. A law intended to make up for the uprooting of orange groves for development in Southern California had gone into play. It offered tax advantages to anyone growing at least 20 trees. There was no need to sell the oranges, just grow the trees. Smith said the law was quickly rescinded because so many people were taking the state up on the offer.
The 26 Robertson navel orange trees planted by the Bakers are on the edge of the citrus zone. Go much farther north than Redding and it gets too cold for citrus trees (unless they are in a greenhouse or other protected place). Smith said one survey he's seen lists Cottonwood as the citrus demarcation line.
"This far north it gets a little iffy," he said.
While citrus isn't a sure thing in all of the Redding area, micro- climates and varieties that are less picky about the cold can make it work. Cold air sinks at night and warmer air rises, keeping sloped locations less frosty. So some places, like the hilly west side of Redding where Smith lives, have just enough winter warmth for citrus to thrive.
That protection only goes so far, however. Every decade or so the north state gets hit by a blast of super-chilled arctic air. The prolonged freeze in 1972 killed citrus and eucalyptus trees up and down the state. Smith figured the citrus trees at his home were goners too. So in June of 1974, he began to uproot the lifeless forms and replace them with new trees. That's when he noticed shoots coming out from some of the roots.
The typical citrus tree is actually two trees merged into one. The plant that produces the fruit is grafted onto rootstock selected for vigor and disease resistance. The Robertson navel oranges in Smith's grove had been killed by the freeze, but the roots they were grafted onto survived.
Smith shared this story with friend William "Larry" Farrell. Farrell, who has been practicing dentistry in the Redding area since 1968, knows more than teeth. He's long had a love of botany. When he was about 9 years old, a gardener at his family home in Fresno showed him how to splice a piece of one tree onto another so that the tree would produce more than one variety of fruit. He became fascinated with the concept, reading about it and experimenting with it.
Farrell went on to work at a nursery and had a side business of grafting trees. He later got a bachelor's degree in geology, joined the Marines, enrolled in dental school and started his dental practice, but he never lost his interest in plants. So when Smith mentioned the citrus orchard, he jumped in to help.
"They seemed thrashed," Farrell said, recalling the first time he saw the sad little grove.
Farrell and Smith worked together in the spring of 1975 splicing three to five buds of new orange trees onto each of the stumps. After learning the technique, Smith grafted more trees in the spring of 1976.
The grafting took. Sixteen trees were brought back to life. Farrell said "it's amazing" that the hard-hit grove rebounded so well.
Smith said the trees got bigger faster and he got fruit sooner than he would have if he'd dug up the old trees and planted new ones. The grafting took advantage of the well-established roots. Plus he avoided the unpleasant chore of removing a bunch of stumps and roots.
The citrus grove has changed over the years. Smith added new trees and replaced some of the original orange trees with grapefruit, lemons, mandarins and other citrus varieties he wanted to try. He now has 31 citrus trees.
"Citrus is the best," Smith said.
The trees aren't prone to pests or diseases and don't need to be regularly pruned or sprayed like other fruit trees, Smith said.
"There's no routine maintenance and all that other gobbledygook," he said.
In spring, blossoms fill the neighborhood with fragrance.
But the sweetest reward is the fruit. The Smiths enjoy lots of fresh orange juice. They have an abundance of oranges as well as mandarins, lemons, limes and kumquats. The homegrown citrus is more flavorful than grocery store citrus because it's picked later, when it is sweeter, Smith said.
"Citrus is an investment in the future," Smith said. "And there's nothing that pays back better over time."
Laura Christman can be reached at 225-8222 or
lchristman@redding.com.
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Here are some tips for growing citrus
Randy Smith, who has 31 citrus trees at his Redding home, offered these hints and observations about growing citrus.
Be careful where you plant. A patio wall might provide protection from winter cold, but it can trap heat and cook the tree in the summer.
It takes five years for a tree to become established and start bearing fruit. Young trees have small roots and need more frequent watering than mature trees. New trees are fussy about watering, and rightly so, he says.
Good drainage is important. Waterlogged soil in summer leads to root rot. Building up the planting area in a slight cone shape can help.
If a tree looks dead after a hard freeze, dont write it off. Leave it for a full year. It may sit there shocked and dazed and then the next spring think, Boy, Ive got to get going, Smith said.
Frost cloth and Christmas lights (old-fashioned large ones) are some of the strategies recommended by the University of California for protecting citrus trees when a hard freeze is forecast. Smith used to cover his trees with blankets and shake the snow off of them, but he found his efforts to protect the trees were hurting them by snapping off branches. He also tried smudge pots, but those were messy and turned the neighborhood smoky. He determined the best strategy was to just leave them alone. How damaging a freeze is depends not only on how low the temperature drops, but how long it stays there. Trees can handle most short freezes. This grove has been through 18 degrees twice since weve been here, he said.
Pick a variety adapted to your climate and space. Smith says there is a multitude of great citrus to choose from. Limes are very touchy about cold and dont do well in Redding, but hes had good luck with Bearss, a lime that turns yellow but still tastes like a lime. For oranges, Smith recommends Washington navel. For lemons, try Lisbon. He also recommends Marsh grapefruit. You just cant beat them. Kumquats arent bothered by cold the way most citrus trees are and produce a lot of fruit. Its the most resilient of all. Its bulletproof for frost, Smith said.
Trees tend to cycle, with big years for fruit followed by a scarce crop the next year. To stop the cycling, thin fruit when it is about the size of quarter if a tree puts out lots of fruit.
Oranges from backyard trees taste sweeter than oranges from stores because commercial growers harvest before all the acids turn to sugars. Smith said one of the advantages of growing citrus over other fruits is that the fruit can be picked over a long period of time. You dont have do deal with an onslaught of fruit that is ripe all at once and needs to be picked.
