I guess this really dry year has had a pretty negative impact on my cirtus trees in the back yard. My orange trees (Mars and Navel) have no fruit this year. The Valencia tree has some fruit but it will not be ready till February or March...usually the possums get the fruit on this tree before it gets ready.

I have a small crop of Star Rubys and they have been good. I usually irrigate the yard three or four times a year. I guess that the heat day after day and the lack of water must be the problem. I probably need to irrigate right after the trees bloom so that the fruit stays on the trees. Watering with the hose in my yard is not really possible because the trees are more than 100 feet from the house.

Incidentally, if you want good fresh squeezed orange juice you can get it from Klements Farms (Aggies) on the corner of 3 mile line and Taylor road. The price just went up to about $10/gallon and is always available. They also have red grapefruit juice if you like that. Those of us on blood pressure medicine are not supposed to be eating or drinking grapefruit but I do once in a while anyway. (especially the grapefruit pie that is to kill for).

Grapefruit pie...it took me 20 years of living in McAllen before I ever heard of such a thing. A Spanish prof at panam mentioned it as her favorite dessert and the entire class thought she was messing with us. She then asked us if we were really from the RGV. She was from South America.

Same here. I have lived in the valley for nearly 60 years and only had grapefruit pie last year. I has certainly been added to my list of favorites.

If you haven't had it before think...strawberry pie. I guess that I am lucky. My wife taught cooking for 30 years so shes pretty good at it.

I think the yield will vary from year to year. My orange tree is loaded this year. Don't know the variety, though. Not naval, maybe a Mars or Valencia.

Yeah my yard has a couple of dry spots and my little fruit trees dont look too great.

There's not really any reason for trees to have significantly diff volumes of fruit from one year to the next.

Fruit will only set on "new" wood each year. If you keep water and nutrition where it needs to be (water DEEP) you should have a good crop every year.

If you haven't done it before, before the new bloom sets (between now and March 1st?) PRUNE those trees back. Sides and tops. Old wood won't set new fruit anyway.

What is the rule of thumb for irrigation? Should the trees be irrigated before blooming?

[This message has been edited by oldvalleyrat (edited 1/8/2012 3:47p).]

Probably depends on how much moisture is at the root level.

Google your question and put "South Texas" in the query. There's a TON of info out there from A&M Extension Service.

TONS

I called the experiment station in Weslaco and they referred me the the Citrus center in Kingsville. I got a Dr. on the line with an Indian type name. He told me to flood irrigate my yard every three weeks for the citrus. I told him that the irrigation districts usually limit the number of times you can irrigate, he said that wasnt true and I thanked him and hung up.

I know that isn't right because I was the manager of an irrigation district for a couple of years. I finally found one site that suggested that you should fertilize and irrigate your trees around the end of this month. I guess that my neighbors and I will do that. I suppose that they are saying to irrigate and fertilize about the time the trees bloom. I checked the trees and all of them have at least one bud on them so it shouldn't be long.

Not nit-picking here, but if you have a lawnwater contract, you can irrigate as frequently as you desire. I know on my property I just turn on the valve and flood away.

As for the citrus, I think fertilizing prior to the bloom, with adequate watering, should set up the trees for a good bloom. I actually try to stress the trees after the fruit set because I believe it yields juicier, sweeter fruit but I have no factual data to support that opinion.