Lemon Trees

It all started at my grocery store. Lemons were on sale 5 for $1 and oranges were on sale 2 for $1. Who could pass that up? So I bought 5 lemons and 2 oranges. I saw a recipe on Pinterest (awesome site) for a homemade all-purpose citrus cleaner and wanted to try it. I'll post the recipe later on my Saving Money and Going Green blog. So, I juiced the lemons and oranges and made a gallon of orange/lemonade. It was wonderful! It didn't even last a day. I cut up the peelings for the all-purpose citrus cleaner, and was left with a small bowl of lemon seeds.

These seeds were plucked from lemons on about November 7th. I decided I was going to get the absolute most out of that $2 that I possibly could, so I decided to attempt to grow a lemon tree. So off I go to GOOGLE. Of course, everyone does things differently so I had to just choose a method of germination and cross my fingers that it would work. I decided to clean my seeds thoroughly and wrap them in a damp paper towel. I then put them in a ziplock bag and placed them near my grow lamp. After about 4 weeks, yes, 4 weeks, this is what i get:

I was actually pretty happy with this. I decided to change the paper towel because it looked like it was getting mold spots on it. So, I wrapped them in a clean wet paper towel, put them back in their ziplock bag and put them back under the grow light for another 2 weeks. I'm sorry, but I don't have a photo of them at 6 weeks, but they had a lot more roots by this time, and were starting to sprout leaves. I decided it was time to plant them. I took an 18 count cardboard egg carton and filled it with my compost and planted my seeds. I made sure the roots were completely covered with compost, but left the sprout above the dirt. I then covered the carton with plastic wrap and used 2 straws to keep the plastic wrap raised off of the lemons. Like a mini green house. This is what they looked like at this point:

This is about December 15th. I placed them near my grow light. For Christmas, Randy bought me a green house. It's about 5 1/2 feet tall, about 2 1/2 feet wide, and about 1 1/2 feet deep. I absolutely love it. It has 4 shelves and is small enough to keep indoors. I then removed the plastic wrap from my lemon trees and moved them into the green house. About a week later I found mushrooms growing in them. One morning I found 1 mushroom growing in my Goji berries which were also in the green house. It looked like this:

Pretty, isn't it. Looks are deceiving. By the next morning there were about 20 of them in both my Goji berries and my lemon trees. Once again, I run to GOOGLE. As it turns out, they are called Japanese Umbrella Mushrooms and they are poisonous. I also found these mushrooms growing in my lemon trees:



I still don't know what kind they are. In an attempt to rescue my precious Goji berries and lemon trees from multiple fungi I decided to replant them. I'm not sure if it was the compost, the egg cartons, or a combination of either being in the warm, moist environment of the green house, but I wasn't taking any chances. I decided to plant them in plastic starter containers using only potting soil. To avoid cross contamination I removed all of the compost from the roots and sprayed the plants and roots with a generous amount of colloidal silver since it is known to kill fungus and I happen to have a colloidal silver maker. It worked! No more mushrooms!!! Some of my lemon trees have not grown much, but they are still alive and I'm not giving up on them. Some have really thrived. This is what they look like today, January 9th, 2012.

Once a week I spray them with a mixture of about 1 part colloidal silver, about 1 part Epsom salt, and about 10 parts water. The colloidal silver destroys bacteria, virus, and fungus. The Epsom salt is magnesium, which the soil needs. 2 or 3 weeks ago they all looked like the seed in the bottom right corner of the photo. I have seen lemon trees grown indoors that were about 5 feet tall and producing lemons. That's what I hope to do with these. Hopefully in about a year I will be giving all of my siblings, my daughter, and my parents a 1 to 2 foot tall lemon tree. That would take care of 6 of them. I probably have room for 3 in my house. That leaves 11 lemon trees if they all live. I guess next year I can give them as Christmas gifts!