New Citrus: Kiyomi Tangor & Okitsu Wase Mandarin

   

This week i have acquired two new Citrus buddies for the garden with both being able to be ready to eat straight off the tree. 
The first is the Kiyomi Tangor. I chose this guy as i've been FOMOing about the Sumo/Dekopon tree for a while now (check out my post here) and i discovered that Kiyomi is one of the parent varieties of the Dekopon so would be worth a try.
Kiyomi is a Tangor hybrid. It has a parentage of Miyagawa-wase (Satsuma mandarin) crossed with a Trovita orange at the Okitsu Branch, Fruit Research Station in Japan in 1949. It was named Kiyomi after the temple Seiken-ji (清見寺) and the lagoon Kiyomi-gata (清見潟) near its experiment station in Shizuoka city
Fruit are medium-large (150-200 g), flat, seedless, juicy, and orange scented.
The tree bears good crops of large, bright orange fruit with pebbly-textured skin that is fairly easy to peel. Rich and spicy in flavor, Kiyomi are sweet. Sugar content is normally 11–12°Bx and reaches even 13°Bx if conditions are met. Citric acid content is around 1%. It has no seeds. They will ripen about late September in NZ. The flavour is similar to that of a mikan Mandarin, while the aroma is similar to that of an Orange.

  

The second tree i chose this time is the Okitsu Wase Mandarin. I chose this tree as i had read promising things about them via the Fruit Mentor. In his taste test of over 60 varieties, Okitsu Wase was the overall winner:

"Okitsu Wase Satsuma was the overall winner. Tasters reported Okitsu Wase to be sweet with excellent flavor and very juicy. One taster also noted its fragrant skin. On a scale from 1 to 9, Okitsu Wase scored 7.3, a bit higher than “very good” (7)."

Another desirable quality is that Okitsu Wase is an early season Satsuma, in fact is the earliest ripening cultivar so is a good choice to help extend the season.

The fruit is Seedless, Easy Peel, good rich flavour with low acid and high sugar.  The skin has smooth pale yellow peel, and plump, juicy flesh. 

Okitsu is a variety from the Unshiu tangerine group Wase, second most popular and cultivated variety in Japan. It was discovered in 1940 as a Miyagawa' seedling in the Okitsu research station, Honshu. It was bred by crossing 'Miyagawa' with Poncirus. It is most commonly growing in the colder subtropical areas with harsh winters.

'Okitsu' is a big shrub or a small tree, it can grow up to 2,7m and has very wide, spherical crown made of curly branches with small spikes. The foliage is usually very scarce, but the large, pointed leaves resemble those of Unshiu tangerine 'Clausellina'. 'Okitsu' starts producing at very early age and is fairly resistant to cold but also dislikes hot and dry climates and can easily get sun-damaged during hot weather. It is also necessary to thin the fruit shortly after formation, because this variety usually produces much more than it can bring to full ripeness. Pollination is not required to produce high yields. Okitsu fruit is distinctively spherical or slightly flattened, average (5,5-8cm) weighs 120-190g and has a small navel with big neck. Its dark orange rind is soft, smooth, thin (2-4mm) and well attached to the refreshing, juicy (54%) orange pulp, which contains 19% sugars. It is usually divided into 11-12 segments and usually doesn't contain any seeds. 

The fruit is usually harvested in March-April in NZ and contains lots of acids in the pre-ripening phase; it usually ripens 15-20 days earlier than 'Owari'. Almost unripe fruit has to be carefully harvested and put into the storage to let it ripen. It is vital to be careful and not to damage the thin rind or otherwise the fruit dries out.

The Citrus Hedge

I thought i'd share with you guys one area of my garden i call "The Citrus Hedge".
I planted most of it about 3 years ago and it seems this year it has really grown to its full potential. It runs along the southern edge of my section and was initially planted to screen off the neighbours for privacy but the main purpose was a space to practice intensive backyard orchard culture for delicious fruit! I first came across the concept of Backyard Orchard Culture online at Dave Wilson Nursery. (See Below). 

Here's what i have planted, just in this hedge area:

Feijoa Apollo

Eureka Lemon

Tarrocco Blood Orange

Tahitian Lime

Scarlett Burgess Mandarin

Variegated Calamondin

Tahitian Lime

Australian Finger Lime

Buddha's Hand

Cara Cara Orange

Invictus Gooseberry

Moro Blood Orange

Grapes : Albany Black & Niagra

Also planted down the side of house i have:

Peach Golden Queen

Apple Pacific Rose

Nectarine 

Peach Pixzee

They all seem to be growing well together the only thing is that some of the trees are more vigorous than others, so need pruning to control them so they don't invade the other tree's space. I have to be careful in the timing of this however as in NZ we have a nasty bug called Lemon Tree Borer that, if its around, will smell the freshly cut wounds and lay its eggs which in turn will bore destructively through the tree's branches. I also prune to keep the trees from taking over the whole space down the side of the house and to allow for walking down the area.

What is Backyard Orchard Culture? Here's the low down in a nutshell......

The objective of Backyard Orchard Culture is a prolonged harvest of tree-ripe fruit from a small space in the yard. This is accomplished by planting an assortment of fruit trees close together and keeping them small by summer pruning.
Backyard Orchard Culture Is Not Commercial Orchard Culture.
For years, most of the information about growing fruit came from commercial orchard culture: methods that promoted maximum size for maximum yield but required 12-foot ladders for pruning, thinning and picking, and 400 to 600 square feet of land per tree. Tree spacing had to allow for tractors. Most people today do not need nor expect commercial results from their backyard fruit trees. A commercial grower would never consider using his methods on a 90 ft. x 100 ft. parcel, so why should a homeowner?

Backyard Orchard Culture Is High Density Planting And Successive Ripening.

The length of the fruit season is maximized by planting several (or many) fruit varieties with different ripening times. Because of the limited space available to most homeowners, this means using one or more of the techniques for close-planting and training fruit trees; two, three or four trees in one hole, espalier, and hedgerow are the most common of these techniques. Four trees instead of one means ten to twelve weeks of fruit instead of only two or three. Close-planting offers the additional advantage of restricting a tree's vigor. A tree won't grow as large when there are competing trees close by. Close-planting works best when rootstocks of similar vigor are planted together. In many climates, planting more varieties can also mean better cross-pollination of pears, apples, plums and cherries, which means more consistent production.

Backyard Orchard Culture Means Accepting The Responsibility For Tree Size.
Small trees yield crops of manageable size and are much easier to spray, thin, prune, net and harvest than large trees. If trees are kept small, it is possible to plant a greater number of trees in a given space, affording the opportunity for more kinds of fruit and a longer fruit season. Pruning is the only way to keep most fruit trees under twelve feet tall. The most practical method of pruning for size control is Summer Pruning. There are several reasons why summer pruning is the easiest way to keep fruit trees small. Reducing the canopy by pruning in summer reduces photosynthesis (food manufacture), thereby reducing the capacity for new growth. Summer pruning also reduces the total amount of food materials and energy available to be stored in the root system in late summer and fall. This controls vigor the following spring, since spring growth is supported primarily by stored foods and energy. And, for many people, pruning is more enjoyable in nice weather than in winter, hence more likely to get done.