permaculture

[Les Mulder <les@mulder.com.au>]

Lawrence asked:
>I have a nice dwarf Meyer lemon in a large pot that set lots of blooms this 
>year. I think it need fertilizer of some sort. 
>What type should I use?
Hi Lawrence,
We have one of these too. Like all citrus, they are gross feeders. 
We feed ours regularly (at least every month or so) some or all of the 
following:
Seaweed solution
Charlie Carp (made from mashed up European carp dredged out of our rivers)
Urine
Worm tea
Worm castings
Compost

Our tree is planted in I don't remember what, but I did cut out the bottom of 
the pot to give it some room to grow. We have more lemons than you can poke a 
stick at.

>If it set flowers does it mean that it will set fruit?
If you haven't fed it then probably not. Also, while it's self-fertile, it 
needs critters to pollinate it - hopefully you've arranged things so you have 
some of those.

OTOH, climatic factors probably have an influence too. We live in a city that 
probably has the most growth friendly climate on earth. Some people tell me 
we live in a temperate climate, I think it's more sub-tropical (we get a real 
frost maybe one year in three). Either way, you just plant stuff here and it 
tends to just grow. The only hassle we have is all the other critters that 
like to compete with us for the produce. Even our $%&* dog likes browsing in 
the garden!!!

So, your mileage may vary, but just feed it anything you can find and you 
should be right. They particularly like being peed on...

Cheers,

Les