How to grow lime from a stone or cuttings at home

Lime is a citrus fruit, a relative of lemon. It has a yellow-green or dark green skin and greenish flesh. The fruit contains a large amount of vitamins C, A and B. Its taste is less sour than lemon, and the aroma is more tart and resembles tangerine.

The plant is unpretentious. It is not demanding on the composition of the soil and gives a crop already for 3 years of life. It is not difficult to grow it in a pot at home from a cuttings or seeds. How to plant lime and how to care for it - read on.

The best lime varieties for home potted cultivation

Room lime grown from seeds or cuttings. If the planting material is taken from fruits bought in a regular supermarket, it will not be possible to determine the type of plant. The stores usually sell hybrid fruits that are not suitable for breeding.

Cuttings and seeds purchased from a specialty store produce varietal limes in a pot. In this case, you can choose the most suitable variety.

For growing at home, varieties are chosen that are distinguished by low growth and unpretentiousness:

• Santa Barbara;
• Mexican;
• Palestinian;
• Tahiti;
• Orange;
• Rangipur;
• Calamansi;
• Kaffir.

Growing lime from seed at home

Growing lime from seed is a longer and more complex process than planting a cuttings. This method allows you to get strong and hardy plants that will bear fruit longer.

You can plant lime seeds in an apartment all year round. In winter and autumn, you will need a phytolamp, which is turned on for 5-6 hours. If you plant a seed in the second half of February, you will not have to highlight the lime additionally. Therefore, it is recommended to start growing the plant in late winter or early spring.

note! When grown by seed, lime begins to bear fruit 4-5 years after planting.

Selection and preparation of seeds

Each lime contains about 4 seeds. If you decide to buy fruits in the store, you will have to take several pieces to collect enough planting material.

Fruits must be firm, regular in shape, free from spots, damage, rot, mold and other signs of disease.

The collected bones are prepared:

1. Washed from the pulp and sorted out. Dense, light (white or cream) bones are selected without dark spots and damage. Soft and empty seeds are thrown away.
2. Disinfect - soak for 30 minutes. in a light pink solution of potassium permanganate or hydrogen peroxide.
3. To stimulate germination, to make the seedlings stronger and more resistant, the seeds are soaked for 30-60 minutes. in humic fertilizers.

The treated seeds are allowed to dry, after which they are planted in the prepared soil.

Council. Some gardeners recommend carefully, so as not to damage the cotyledons, file the hard shell of the bone - this will accelerate germination.

Pot and soil

In order for the seeds to germinate quickly, and the seedlings to feel comfortable, it is important to use the correct soil for planting. Lime loves fertile, loose soil. In heavy soil, the plant begins to ache and rot.

The easiest option is to buy a universal soil mixture at a gardening store, mixing it in a 2: 1 ratio with river sand. Prepare the soil and independently. To do this, take:

• garden land - 1 part;
• humus - 1 part;
• sand - 1 part.

A glass of ash is added to a bucket of mixture - it normalizes acidity and acts as an additional fertilizer.

Council. It is recommended to prepare a large amount of soil mixture at once, it will be needed for transplanting.

The soil is disinfected in one of the following ways:

• pour boiling water over;
• poured with hot copper sulfate;
• watered with a dark pink solution of potassium permanganate;
• calcined in the oven.

Drainage must be used: shell rock, broken ceramics, crushed expanded clay, fine gravel.

It is recommended to sow more seeds than needed. Not all planting material will germinate. Seeds are sown in one common container, such as a wooden box or plastic tray.

For the first pick, use containers with a diameter of up to 6 cm. It is desirable that these are special flower pots. For each next transplant, take a container 3-5 cm larger than the previous one.

The containers are also disinfected by soaking them in a dark pink solution of potassium permanganate for half an hour or pouring boiling water over them.

Important! There should be drainage holes in the bottom of the lime growing container. Otherwise, the water will stagnate.

Planting and care during germination

Step-by-step instructions on how to grow lime from a seed at home:

1. A 1 cm thick drainage layer is poured at the bottom of the box, the rest of the volume is filled with soil.
2. The soil is moistened with warm water from a spray bottle.
3. The bones are buried 1.5-2 cm into the ground, a distance of at least 5 cm should remain between them.
4. After planting, the soil is watered, the boxes are covered with foil and removed to a warm place.

The seeds germinate from 3 weeks to 2 months. Until this moment, the crops should be under the film. The soil is moistened as it dries from a spray bottle with warm water. Every day, the film is opened slightly for 30-60 minutes. for airing.

After seed germination, the duration of airing is increased, after a week the film is completely removed.

Seedlings are placed on a windowsill... The east or west side of the apartment is best suited. If you put lime near the south window, the immature plants will have to be shaded during the day. On the north side, the seedlings will not have enough natural light.

Water the sprouts from a spray bottle with warm settled water as the soil dries out. They moisten not only the soil, but also the plants themselves.

It is important to protect seedlings from drafts. Otherwise, they will get sick with a black leg or die. The ideal temperature during this period is + 25 ... + 26 ° С. The minimum temperature is + 12 ° C.

When 2-3 true leaves appear on the seedlings, they are transplanted into individual pots. The strongest specimens are chosen for further cultivation. They are distinguished by an elastic thick stem, bright color of leaves, short internodes.

A centimeter layer of drainage is poured onto the bottom of the lime transplant pot. The rest of the volume is filled with soil so that 1-2 cm remains to the edge of the pot.

The seedling is carefully removed from the common box with a wooden stick or spoon, taking care not to damage the roots. The plant is transplanted into a pot without deepening the root collar. After transplanting, the lime is watered with warm, settled water and allowed to take root for at least two days away from the sun.

Planting and rooting the cuttings

Growing lime from cuttings is much easier than growing from seeds. In this case, the tree will begin to bear fruit as early as the third year after planting.

Buy lime cuttings in a specialty store. This allows you to select the desired variety. Also, planting material can be asked from friends who grow this tree.

Specialty stores sell shoots ready for planting. To make planting material on your own, choose a young branch at the top of the tree and cut it off at an angle of 45 ° with a pruner or a construction knife. The resulting stalk should be 10-15 cm long and have 5 healthy vegetative buds.

Before planting, the greens on the handle are cut off, leaving 2-3 of the largest leaves. If the stalk is not planted immediately after separation from the mother bush, the cut is pre-cut at the same angle.

The stalk is placed as a cut point in the Kornevin solution for 10-12 hours. This stimulates the germination of roots.

For rooting the cuttings, the soil mixture used for germinating seeds is suitable. However, sometimes ordinary disinfected sand is taken.

The shoot is planted in moist soil so that it does not collapse without support. It is convenient to use the cut bottom of the bottle as a container for sprouting roots. The top of the bottle is placed over the seedling to create a greenhouse environment.

For germination, lime requires a temperature of + 25 ... + 26 ° C and high humidity. The top of the bottle is removed for 30-60 minutes. for airing every day. The sand is moistened every day, and the plant is sprayed with warm, settled water.

The cutting will take root in about a month. After this, the airing time is increased, gradually accustoming the plant to indoor conditions. Then the top of the bottle is removed.

2 months after planting, the seedling is transplanted into a pot with a diameter of 6-8 cm. The container is filled with drainage and universal soil mixed with sand. The rooted petiole is immersed in it so that it is covered with soil 1 cm above the level of the upper roots. After that, the soil is watered.

Indoor lime care rules

Growing lime at home is easier than growing it in a greenhouse. However, houseplants also need attention. Next, we will tell you how to properly care for limes so that the plant blooms and gives fruit.

Lighting

A tree needs 12 hours of daylight. It is not recommended to leave it in direct sunlight. To achieve optimal lighting, the plant is placed on a western or eastern window sill. If the lime is on the south window, it is removed from the windowsill during the daytime to protect it from the scorching sun. It is not necessary to illuminate adult plants in winter, since at this time the tree is dormant.

Temperature

In the summer, the optimum temperature for growing lime is + 26 ... + 30 ° С. In winter, it is recommended to reduce this indicator to + 19 ... + 22 ° С.

Humidity

Humidity must be at least 80%. To provide the tree with the necessary conditions in summer, spring and autumn, the tree is sprayed with water at room temperature daily. In winter, this is done only if the plant is near the battery. It is recommended to put several containers of water or a humidifier in the room.

Watering

The plant is watered as the top layer of the earth dries up, usually once every 2 days. In winter, the amount of watering is reduced to 1 time per week.

Cleaning

Once a week, the lime leaves are wiped with a damp cloth. Once every 14 days, the tree is washed under the shower.

Bloom

When the tree blooms for the first time, all inflorescences are cut off. This will allow him to maintain strength and set fruit in the future.

Pollination

To increase the number of ovaries, limes are artificially pollinated. To do this, pollen is spread between flowers with a soft brush or cotton swabs.

Fruiting

In the first fruiting, 2-3 most developed ovaries are left on the plant. Otherwise, the lime will dump all the fruits. Next time, 2 times more ovaries are left. In subsequent fruiting, all the fruit set is left.

Transplants

Before the first fruiting, lime is reloaded annually. To do this, it is taken out of the pot along with the earth and loaded into a larger pot, filling up the missing soil and not deepening the root collar. When the tree begins to bear fruit, it is transplanted once every 3 years. At the same time, old roots are cut off.

Top dressing

Lime loves fertile soil. To get a plentiful and tasty harvest, it must be fed. In the warm period, the plant is fertilized once every 7-14 days. In winter, the tree does not need to be fed.

How to feed lime to make the fruit tastier:

1. Potassium-phosphorus fertilizers.1 kg of ash is added to 5 liters of water, infused for a day, then used to water the plant. Fertilizer is prepared from superphosphate (15 g) and potassium nitrate (10 g) per 5 liters of water. The drug is not only watered, but also sprayed on the tree.
2. Decoction of herbs: nettle, chamomile, horsetail.
3. Food waste. This can be water infused with a banana peel (peel 5 bananas in 3 liters of water), leftover tea and coffee.
4. Beer. It is useful to water citrus fruits with beer and spray the leaves with a drink.
5. Fish broth. 250 g of fish waste is boiled for half an hour after boiling in 2 liters of water. The resulting broth is filtered and used for watering lime.

It is recommended to alternate the described fertilizers. The day before feeding, the lime is watered. Special fertilizers for citrus fruits “BioMaster”, ASB Greenworld, “Zdraven” are also used.

Pruning

To make your lime fruitful, it is important to shape it correctly. Use the following scheme:

1. When the tree reaches the desired height, the apical shoot is cut off. This stimulates the formation of lateral branches.
2. The next year, the shoots are cut by 1/3 of the length. The crown is given the desired shape with a haircut.
3. Further, all old, weak and damaged shoots are removed. Strong branches are removed only if they thicken the crown.

Diseases and pests

Homemade limes are sometimes infested with pests. The most common are aphids, scale insects and spider mites. They are recognized by the following features:

• lime greens turn yellow, wither and fall off, the plant discards inflorescences, shoots do not develop;
• a gray or white bloom forms on the leaves;
• a cobweb appears on the seamy side of the leaf plates and young shoots;
• small insects of green, red or red-brown color are visible;
• in the area of ​​internodes and on young shoots, film formations are formed.

When any of the described signs appear, the lime is washed under the shower with warm water, after which it is sprayed with soapy water. To prepare it, dissolve a quarter of a piece of laundry soap in 2 liters of water. If this does not help, use chemical agents, for example, Actellik.

The most common indoor lime disease is homoz. Its main feature is the appearance of cracks on the branches and young shoots. If the plant is not cured, it will die. To fight infection, lime is sprayed with copper sulfate. Damaged areas are smeared with garden pitch.

It is interesting:

Step by step guide: how to plant a seed orange at home.

How to grow a lemon from a seed at home.

Conclusion

Growing lime at home is a process that requires attention from the grower. The plant is often fertilized, watered, fed, and a crown is formed. Subject to the rules of care, it easily takes root, grows quickly and does not get sick.

Lime is considered an unpretentious plant. Gardener's mistakes rarely lead to his death. However, the tree gives fruit only with proper care.