THE START

THE START

(HOW IT ALL BEGAN)

In 1985 I bought a Citrus madurensis (Calamondin orange) from a garden centre. It was in flower at the time and looked beautiful and later on that year I had the first taste of the fruit it produced, it was then I realised it was an acidic fruit.

The plant grew tremendously through the summer and feeling relatively pleased with the success I embarked on the hunt for something more palatable. I soon managed to track down a Washington Navel Orange from another garden centre. The winter proved difficult for the plants, but they seemed to bounce back in the spring. I added a Lemon, Lime and Tangelo along with a Banana, Passionfruit, grapes and figs and most importantly an ex demo glasshouse 10ft x 12ft.

The passionflower flourished and fruited, the banana flourished and fruited and we had plenty of figs and grapes, but we had a very poor crop of citrus. I was not going to be defeated. Having noticed that a lime, tucked away in the corner of the greenhouse, and had not been watered as often as the rest of the Citrus, had faired much better than the rest. It seemed that the lack of water through the winter had benefited this plant tremendously, it flowered profusely in the spring and it had a record-breaking amount of fruit on it.

In a quest for more knowledge on Citrus, I hunted for literature on Citrus. What references I found quite often contradicted each other and nearly every single one stated ‘ Always keep Citrus moist and never let them dry out’.

The others had suffered through the winter, so I decided to adopt the same watering methods as the lime, letting them dry out between each watering and I changed to a high nitrogen feed to encourage new growth to get then back into good condition. Previously I had been using high potash feeds, which the scant literature had recommended. From then on the Citrus came on in leaps and bounds and many more were added to the collection, lemons, grapefruits, and kumquats.

I stopped off at any garden centre I passed in the hope of finding new varieties but it wasn't until much later I realised this was the start of a huge collection.

Everything appeared OK, until one Spring two plants collapsed. I knocked them out of the pots and found what I later discovered to be Vine Weevil. Both the plants’ roots had severely been damaged and the only thing to do was wash off all the soil and re-pot all the plants. Just one of the plants that collapsed did not make it, the other, a Kumquat, lives to this day with a lovely bushy new head. I have since treated nematodes twice a year as a precaution, spring and autumn and have had no problems with vine weevil since.

The collection grew to such an extent, that when it had to be accommodated every available spot in the house, greenhouse and later the workshop were I built engines in my spare time, was converted with a polycarbonate roof, was used up. Something had to be done! It needed a very good job to supply finances for an enormous glass house or the idea of starting a Citrus Nursery had been mentioned in passing.

The nursery idea was becoming more and more attractive and working in London less, and my wife and I decided to have a go. It took two years to find the right nursery, but the time was not wasted, I started to propagate rootstocks and various other plants, in preparation. It took a little while to get used to budding. I had never seen anyone do it before so had to rely on books to teach me. I starting with raffia which was disastrous but with modern plastic tape I soon had a success rate of about 90%.

I took two trips to Florida to see how things were done out there and to my surprise and relief the nurseries growing citrus in containers were using very similar fertilisers and composts as we were now using over here.

By the time we bought the nursery at the end of 1994 the plants were pushing us out of house and home. We moved into the Nursery in December and spent the next four months cleaning and renovating the glass houses. We opened at Easter 1995. We knew that there was a big interest in citrus in the UK, but were pleasantly surprised at just how big.

I still have that first Calamondin as well!