5 CITRUS TREES That Grow To 10 DEGREES (-12C): Grow Cold Hardy Citrus!

In this video, I share 5 citrus trees that grow IN-GROUND in climates as cold as 10 DEGREES F (-12°C). You can grow these cold hardy citrus varieties with no compromise: they are delicious, top quality citrus varieties! You can be growing citrus trees in places you never imagined!

I've been growing citrus trees in ground in North Carolina for 4 years with incredible success. All 5 citrus tree varieties in this video are grown in ground and have survived my Zone 8a winters with no damage while being provided minimal cold protection. If you want to learn how to grow citrus trees in ground in more temperate winters, look no further!

TABLE OF CONTENTS
0:00 Citrus Growing Tips In Cold Climates
3:38 Citrus Variety #1: Owari Satsuma
5:01 Citrus Variety #2: Brown Select Satsuma
6:24 Citrus Variety #3: Meiwa Kumquat
8:07 Citrus Variety #4: Cara Cara Navel Orange
10:32 Citrus Variety #5: Meyer Lemon
12:55 Why I Recommend Grafted Citrus Trees
14:03 Where To Buy Citrus Trees
14:22 Bonus Citrus Tree: Sugar Belle Tangerine
16:42 Adventures With Dale

If you have any questions how to grow citrus trees in ground in places with chilly winters, have questions about growing fruit trees or want to know about the things I grow in my raised bed vegetable garden and edible landscaping food forest, are looking for more gardening tips and tricks and garden hacks, have questions about vegetable gardening and organic gardening in general, or want to share some DIY and "how to" garden tips and gardening hacks of your own, please ask in the Comments below!

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ABOUT MY GARDEN
Location: Southeastern NC, Brunswick County (Wilmington area)
34.1°N Latitude
Zone 8A

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© The Millennial Gardener

#gardening #garden #gardeningtips #citrus #citrustree

[TheMillennialGardener]

If you found this video helpful, please "Like" and share to help increase its reach! Thanks for watching 😊TIMESTAMPS for convenience:
0:00 Citrus Growing Tips In Cold Climates
3:38 Citrus Variety #1: Owari Satsuma
5:01 Citrus Variety #2: Brown Select Satsuma
6:24 Citrus Variety #3: Meiwa Kumquat
8:07 Citrus Variety #4: Cara Cara Navel Orange
10:32 Citrus Variety #5: Meyer Lemon
12:55 Why I Recommend Grafted Citrus Trees
14:03 Where To Buy Citrus Trees
14:22 Bonus Citrus Tree: Sugar Belle Tangerine
16:42 Adventures With Dale

[bigdrum]

Dude ...you are the man! Just found you a little while ago. I am a half German, 72 yrs old and am open for education. I have 4.68 acres just above you... Franklinton, NC and I am struggling to find good info to grow everything in this area. I am a sponge for information and am willing to listen and learn. I have a small orchard planted, but not doing well, and need help. Got my first fig plants to produce and oh my GOD...what a delight... would love to connect and start the learning process for our area... I want to know EVERYTHING! I am willing to buy and share knowledge for us all. Let me know how to connect properly and get this game going...Frank, the old dude from just north of you.

[lety]

Not sure if you mentioned it, but planting on the south wall of your house to give it shelter really helps too, especially if you have masonry walls as they stay warm for some time after dark.

[diananazaroff]

I'm in zone 8a, east and a tiny bit south of Atlanta. I've had 8 citrus trees in pots for the last 7-8 years. Owari Satsuma, Meyer Lemon, Ruby Red Grapefruit, Blood Orange, Washington Navel, Key Lime, Mandarin Orange (don't know the variety), Hamlin Orange. For the first 5-6 years, they stayed outside during the spring thru fall and I brought them in during winter.
I'm getting too old to keep shlepping them in, so I left them outside during winter for the last 2 years. First winter, 3 of my trees were bare of leaves going into the winter due to bug issues and I figured if they didn't make it, then so be it. All 8 came thru the winter and even the bare trees leafed back out.
Last winter, I lost the Key Lime. From reading I've done, it was more sensitive to cold (and apparently it was the host plant for the infestation of mealy bugs I've had for most of the years, since I have NONE this year). They were even out during a week of lows in the high teens and made it. In pots. They are up against a wood fence on the South side of my yard and were protected from wind and are close to a structure, but not next to it. They're under deciduous trees, so get dappled light in the summer and more sun in the winter.
This year, my mandarin orange and Meyer lemon have fruit. Now that I've seen them in ground in your video, I'm thinking of doing that myself. I don't know that I'll do the pickle barrels, but I'm definitely going to look at the tree covers you showed. I've been using old sheets and they have a tendency to blow away.
What sun exposure are yours getting? I've done everything from full sun to dappled shade and am having mixed results.
I've also grown a few mandarin orange trees from seed taken from a fruit from a tree in Tifton, GA. I figure if it can grow there, it'll survive here. They were put in the ground this spring at about 1' high and are now about 4' high. I'm also trying it with a seed I got from a Ruby Red grapefruit. All of them have been outside since germination and have survived the winters so far.
Exciting stuff!

[LiamRappaport]

I'm experimenting with 5 lemon trees that I grew from organic meyer lemons in 2014. I grow them in pots on my covered 2nd floor balcony. So far one of them has grown lemons and the others have flowered all with extremely minimal fertilizing. (I'm going to try to be nicer to them starting next year.) They all have survived 25F nighttime temperatures outside with no ill effects.

[raykinney]

Thanks, great info. I'm in 8b central Oregon coast range 17 miles inland from the coast. Growing sweet chestnut, King fig plants and fruit, but now excited to experiment with citrus too! I built two medium sized cattle panel tunnels with greenhouse sheeting over them to protect my starts until they get more cold hardy, now I think that the structures could be ideal for citrus. We rarely get down to 12 degrees F. (perhaps every decade for a night or two) mostly not below 20 degrees during a winter, but I'm experimenting with protections for colder, and ability to increase options to go to if necessary. The sixteen foot cattle panel length produces a nice arched cover if supported off the ground with a four foot knee wall of wooden posts with 2x6's screwed into the posts (one vertical on the post and one horizontal under it). It is 10 to 12 ft tall in the center, so dwarfing citrus grafted onto trifoliate seem great for this interior size. I plan to be able to remove the membrane cover during summer months (quite dry here in summer), yet cover in winter to reduce copious rainfall all winter. I will allow for additional interior suspended membrane cover to be placed over the plants while young, for additional protection and ground heat retention. Black barrels for heat sinks (with potential to add aquarium heater heating if we get a very cold spell in winter. Owari, Yuzu, Bearss lime, meyer lemon, flying dragon for grafting, Washington orange, (soon others as I can obtain them regionally). Perhaps Cara Cara, kumquats, etc. Most are still in pots, but probably into ground as they increase size. This past winter, I covered one structure with a white tarp over the greenhouse sheeting, just to experiment, and was surprised to see that it seemed very effective protection, yet still allowed daylight in (don't know just exactly which wavelength spectrum passing it does, but was adequate it seems compared to the other structure for growth of the plants. I want to build another of these medium sized structures, as they are fairly cheap and easy to build. I'm 77 years old, and planing for less abilities expected at some point. Thanks for all of your 'local food production' encouragement! If some bug pests become a problem, I'm thinking I may be able to quickly reduce them in winter by opening up the doors to cool down just below freezing for a short time, to freeze the little suckers, then close back up before the heat sinks cool down too much. Also, the aquarium heaters use could stop with our frequent power outages, but the heat sinks should keep things okay anyway for a length of time. I will grow clones of each in ground outdoors to compare through the years.

[madpeppermcginiss]

Where have you been all my gardening life!! ❤
Always wanted to grow citrus but always thought completely
out of my realm!! Thank you for your wonderful warming ideas!
You’ve just shot caffeine into my 2024 gardening season!
So glad I found you before trying dwarf fruit trees!

[SpiritOfTheHeretic]

My owari satsuma died all the way back to the root stock at 20F (unprotected). It had no problems with ice storms and snowfalls in the high 20s though.

[marisasanchez]

Great vid 👍🏼 We grow citrus unprotected in Southern Australia. We get down to -4-5 degrees C regularly each Winter. They thrive.

[TheSHOP]

Been growing citrus all my life. I can say, out of all the things you are doing that make the biggest difference for surviving the cold, is your planting location. Planting up again the house and the fence is what's helping you the most. Planting out in an open area makes things exponentially more difficult in the cold. Trade your orange variety for a Hamlin orange and we have the exact same setup. Most of my trees are way to big for covering now, but I still try to cover my young Meyer Lemons and my young Hamlin. This year we got between 14 and 16F for an extended period. I lost leaves, but all the trees are alive. I had an experiment going with a Lisbon, but true lemons do not like any cold. I think it bit the dust. Anyway, good video and your choices were spot on.

[birchbookstore]

Great information and I love how you put the temperatures in Celsius!

[WompWompWoooomp]

I never knew citrus was this cold tolerant, makes me want to give it a shot myself. I'd be interested in a video on propagating citrus cuttings (especially Meyer lemons) if you feel like that'd be worth doing.

[arlosmith]

Although I am in CA and would have no hardiness issues growing citrus, I am impressed with your research. I always knew that Meyer lemon, kumquat, calamondin, and mandarins were hardier than other citrus and could be grown anywhere in our coastal and valley regions with zero protection. [Even in CA, commercial growers often provide heat or smug pots for lemon, lime and grapefruit trees during winter] One piece of advice for folks with cool summer climates: Sour citrus, such as lemons, limes and calamondins do not need summer heat and will ripen well even with summer temperatures in the 50-70 degree range. So if I were growing citrus in containers in Canada or Alaska I would go with sour citrus.

[mjk]

I have had great success with my Meyer Lemon tree in a small greenhouse on the back south sunny side of my utility room. I own a small house with property in Tacoma Washington State USA and for the past 2 years I have had about 100 big ripe very sweet and fragrant Meyer Lemons off of my tree which I drip onto my baked Salmon dinners. They really enhance my meals and freshly picked Lemons are so much better tasting than old shipped grocery store Lemons.

[myacrehomestead]

I live in SW Oklahoma and plan on getting a Meyer lemon tree soon.

[drishratdar]

Absolutely brilliant way of protecting citrus trees. ❤

[patrickc.]

I love this type of information on citrus! You've inspired me to try growing a Satsuma in my 8a zone (hopefully I can get one in the spring) 👍!

[shekharmoona]

My buddy Greg bought citrus while we started from seed. Greg's is by leaps and bounds ahead of us.

[sleepersix]

I just planted a Satsuma orange against my south facing wall in Austin, TX. We'll see if it survives the winter

[horaciogarza]

My Mexican key lime and blood orange 3 yr old trees died from this past February 4 day freeze after a warm winter. Looking into your vids!!!