Your Own Oranges

New Zealand Listener, Volume 1, Issue 6, 4 August 1939, Page 51

Your Own Oranges

Can good sweet oranges be grown in New Zealand? They can, but it depends on what varieties you try and where you try them. You will not get good results at Bluff, and even in the "winterless North" you will get more skin than pulp, and more acid than sugar if you select the wrong varieties. Here is the A.B.C. of the matter according to A. Greig, Orchard Instructor, Tauranga. If you want to know more write to him, or to some other officer wf the Horticultural Division. Department of Agriculture. Good sweet oranges can be grown in New Zealand only under certain conditions. The sweet orange, being a member of the citrus family, has certain fundamental requirements: (1) heat; (2) adequate moisture supply; (3) freedom from severe frosts; (4) shelter. Every home orchard along the east coast of the North Island, from Gisborne to Auckland, and throughout most of North Auckland, should have one or two orange trees. Not only is the fruit of value but the tree is an ornament in any garden. The orange tree is hardier than the lemon, and has a greater frost resistance. If planted on a trifoliata stock it may withstand several degrees. But trifoliata stock is particular-in its requirements. It is deciduous, and a plentiful water supply in summer is essential. It also needs a good deep soil, preferably river flat. If these requirements are met there is no reason why more sweet orange trees for domestic use cannot be planted in this country. On lighter soils sweet

orange or Citronelle stock is to be preferred, and of these two the sweet orange is generally the better, But what are these stocks and why are they necessary? you may ask. Can’t I just put in an orange pip? "Well, you may, but the outcome cannot be guaranteed." It is true that many of our oldest trees were seedlings or grown from pips. The fruit is often excellent, but generally speaking these trees took about twenty years in which to come into bearing. Also a pip will not necessarily grow true to type. Although a peach tree may grow true from stone, the citrus family is well known for cross pollination, The pip which is formed will show this when planted. Thus the results cannot be relied upon if pips are planted.

Pips, however, are sown for stock purposes. The strange thing is that if pips are sown and then buds put on the resulting stocks the formed tree will probably bear fruit in five or six years. It is by this method that most orange trees sold to-day are grown, Of the three stocks already ‘mentioned, trifoliata gives a good colour to fruit, and it is ‘also full of juice. This stock sometimes has a dwarfing effect, but that doesn’t matter much as long as there is affinity between the scion and the stock, or as long as the top and bottom of the tree are suited to each other. If they are not there they will be a difference in truck thickness where top and bottom join. The sweet orange stock is also a good one, and the trees will be larger. There is also not the same danger from a dry spell in summer, but there is a

greater risk from frost, and the fruit probably will not be as excellent as on trifoliata. However, this is a safe stock for most orchards, Remember, too, that all citrus trees must have good drainage. On no account plant an orange tree where it will have "wet feet." Also, give it shelter, Orange trees can withstand more wind than lemon ‘trees, but they need maximum sunlight.