Hello,
I have a nice surprise this year when my "5 star" improved Swingle that I got 9 years ago from Bernhardt Voss in Hamburg not only flowered but gave a decent harvest.
It is from seedling budwood on poncirus and as far as I know the first time this clone is giving fruits.
The bush itself is 2m high, evergreen and never has shown any winter damage. I am not covering it and the last winter it withstood three weeks of frozen ground with one night of -16C with -12C for the following day.
The fruits have the smell of grapefruit without a hint of trifoliata. The juice ( 20 ml) is as acid as lemon, good smell, but when swallowed have some distant aftertaste of poncirus.
I gave it to several persons to taste and they all have opinion that it is a very good aromatic juice resembling grapefruit and lemon. I personally think that is as good as Thomasville as a substitute of the lemon.

Merry Christmas,
Ilya



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I guess these are Swingle Citrumelos? Nice to see some photos of the fruits.
My citrumelo hasn't flowered yet, so no fruits either.

What does "5 star improved" refer to?



Happy holidays!

Marc,
"5star" is how B.Voss calls this variety. As far as I know it is exceptionally vigorous monoebryonic seedling of Swingle citrumelo. Fruits as you see are indeed very different from original Swingle.

Congratulations on your first harvest of this variety! It sounds very interesting. Is this a hybrid of swingle citrumelo and lemon? Can you use the juice as a lemon substitute or does the hint of poncirus spoil it?

I guess it is open pollinated monoembryonic seedling of Swingle. So only mother is known for sure, father could be either Swingle itself or any other citrus in his greenhouse. Extreme hardiness probably points to self pollination by Swingle.
Fruit has a very good smell, juice is also aromatic, somewhere between grapefruit and lemon with grapefruit like bitter note.
Poncirin like note is very distant and only after swallowing, not unpleasant like in most citranges and citrumelos.

Ilya,
congratulation! Great Christmas present from the nature.

Forwatd,
Yes indeed, it is the same plant that I rooted for you.
If it is monoemryonic from self pollination one can expect that resulting population on average should have the same proportion as citrumelo (50%) of poncirus and grapefruit. But individual plants could have between 0 and 100% of poncirus genes.

What you wrote about taste of friuts reminds me of what I heard about "Trifoliate" which is aswell listet in Bernhard Voss' stock.
Best wishes from Vienna
Robert

Today I found six first germinations from these seeds. Amazingly, but all are apparently monoembryonic which means that they probably are coming from the true pollination.



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ilyaC, by "true pollination" I take it you mean by self pollination. This posting has been very interesting and quite instructional, thanks. - Millet (742-)

You are right. Thank you Millet.