Hi all, I'm new to the whole citrus thing. My girlfriend bought me a lemon plant and it's without a doubt the most beautiful plant I have ever seen. I have a few questions.
1. How many times do I have to give it water?
2. Do i have to add supplements or something?
3. When do the lemons grow and how many times a year?
4. I have the plant for two weeks and it already doubled in height, do I have to cut it?

Here are the pictures:


Here you can see that in only two weeks the plant has grown very young green leaves. Should i cut these?



Here you can see there is already a lemon growing, will it grow to a full sized lemon, or will it drop off?



Here you see I think flowers on the plant.

From what I can tell from the pics, you have a Meyer Lemon. I would guess that it has been grown from a cutting. The Meyer is a Lemon/Mandarin hybrid. A very forgiving and thus, popular citrus for beginners. It will bloom several times a year and can produce large juicy fruit. If properly treated it will have fruit and blooms at any given time.

I would not cut it back unless or until you re-pot it. The Meyer tends to be more of a bush than a tree
If you are just beginning with citrus, don't do anything to it until you search around on the internet under "Meyer Lemon" etc. There is plenty of information available on this site if you do a search on it.

Thank you. Your information was very helpful.

Tom's right about pruning-- you should hold off until the tree outgrows the space you have for it. Since it is probably a cutting and the source was from a mature tree, you do not need to worry about returning the tree to a juvenile by pruning (as would be the case if it were a seedling). But pruning is really only needed to maintain the size to fit the space you have.

One other thing I should tell you is that your tree will grow in spurts (called flushes). Once the current growth is complete, the top growth will stop for 1 to 2 months while the roots begin a growth spurt to support the new top, when the roots have finished, the top will grow again.

Welcome to the Citrus Forum, it is a pleasure to have you as a member. When you water your lemon tree water it well so that approximately 10 percent of the irrigation water drains out the bottom of the container, then DO NOT water the tree again until the top two inches feel mostly dry. Over watering is a major killer of containerized citrus. Citrus like a evenly moist growing medium. The tree should be fertilized at least once a month minimum with an acid based fertilizer that contains trace minerals. I fertilize with every watering, however, the frequency of fertilizing depends on the amount (PPM Nitrogen) of fertilizer given with each application. Only about 1 - 3 percent of the blooms will develop into fruit, and then approximately 95 percent of the small fruitlets that originally developed will remain attached to the tree to become mature fruit, so don't be alarmed when you see the fruitlets turn color and fall from the tree. Citrus require VERY LITTLE OR NO PRUNING. Any pruning will cause a loss of fruit production. Take care, hope to see you around the forum for a long time. - Millet

I have bought myself a fertilizer:

http://www.directplant.nl/php/display_image.php?aid=20691

It says I should give it 5-10 ml/l water I give my plant.
It also says sept/oct/nov are months where I should not give any fertilizer.

Is this correct information?

Thanks

Hi guys

Well I'm still new to these forums so please forgive me if I mention something which has already been said. Anyway, I've not grown a Meyers Lemon before so not sure if this will help or not but I suppose it may be worth a try. Here in Thailand we feed our kaffir lime trees with spoilt milk and it really DOES help. Would be interesting to know if it would help with other citrus.

Good luck with your tree.

Ok thank you, again very helpful

It looks like a very nice Meyer. I see from the picture, it's inside the house. Does it stay there? If so which side of the house do you keep it at (N-S-E-W?). And how much light does it get a day.

Again, very good looking tree! Meyer's are my favorite!

Indeed I keep it in the house, but when I get up and the sun shines I put it outside. Another thing is, I have to water my plant every day. And if I don't, at the end of the day the leaves start to hang. When I water it than after a half hour the plant looks very good again.
Is it normal that I have to give it so much water?

No, it is not really normal. Most of my seedlings in containers get water less than once a week, but if you have a very fast draining soil that doesn't retain a lot of water, it may be necessary. Your tree looks healthy.

The new leaves will wilt & hang when in direct sun. Once they are no longer in direct sun they should perk up. The older leaves should not be wilting.