using a blowdryer to aerate the roots with warm air
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sweetlee tangerine from seed

aerator below directing warm air to root base on top
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Seed grown meiwa kumquat tree

Hardy chicago fig sharing bucket light with citrus and sweet potato starts
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nagami kumquat bush and sweetlee tree seed grown

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fig tree cutting gets bucket over top

16 broccoli plants under 8 CFL's use heat from bulbs to warm root base of meiwa above
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Seed grown meiwa kumquat tree gets bucket light overtop.

All these plants are inside in my bedroom where I see them every day to take care of them. The equipment is made out of trash. Spot light fixtures, bucket, wire from broken lamps. I pay for the aluminum foil, light bulbs, and the electricity that provides heat and light to th bedroom.

Steve

i put mine in the greenhouse. it is never below 60F and never above 90F. they seem to love it in there.
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Meyer Mike, this ones for you. Gardenia. Looking pretty good isnt it.
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mike

Greenhouse also. I let mine get a little colder. right now 90F day 50F night. Later in the season Ill let it get a little colder. 80F days and not below 40F night.

Hey Ryan. I will let mine cool off later in the fall/winter very close to your temps.

Thank you for all the input everyone has really nice trees here. I know a fair amount about citrus but still learning everyday from this forum. Is great filled with so many knowledgeable people.

Steve, how long do you use the blower on a plant? Do you do this everyday?

On the small plastic cup inside the coffee cup--5 sec once a day

The meiwa tree in the 1.5 gallon container--------30 seconds once a day

This year my 5 gallon buckets------------------------1 minute once a day

Hey Steve does a heat mat work as well as blow dryer method

A heat mat works far better for providing heat to the bottoms of pots. The heat will percolate up to warm the whole pot. If you insulate the pot sides. the pot will stay nice and warm. The main purpose of the blowdryer is to aerate the potted soil and to keep the soil at the bottom from becoming rancid as this is where the water sits. This helps prevent root rot pathogens. It does provide some warming, but not much. You would have to blow so much air through you risk burning and drying the roots. The pads under your trees will do a world of good. your risk is a cold wind. If your area is not air tight you will lose your trees no mater what you do if it is windy and cold.

mksmth and RyanLo are raising citrus trees north of the mandarin-satsuma line THE CORRECT WAY. The rest of us are just futzing around with a near impossible task

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8 trees do not take up much room in my/a bedroom. They will keep the noise down while you sleep

Steve

Steve.....It's not a bad idea though if you are looking for constant growth...You remind me a lot of my father and his ideas..That is why my Mom says to never let him read your ideas..lol

I have a question about your method though..

Won't the bucket method prevent your trees from wanting to grow width wise?
All my trees want to grow wider instead of tall and thin...

Mike

The seed grown trees reach for the sky, but I have 3 that are branching out. they will do fine this year in their bucket but will need a trashcan next winter to fit the limbs. Once the trees are about 5 feet tall they will no longer be grown in buckets but will be placed in an enclosure about 8 ft by 8 fet by 11 feet tall and will have lights placed all around them. the buckets just get them up to size in rapid order so they will flower much sooner. I am hoping in 5 years or less. It is the kumquats that I am interested in and the sweetlee's will be top grafted rootstock and tree for the kumquats. I have also grown my nagami to provide an interstock for my meiwa to poncirus. I don't have any pictures of my bushes in buckets now but I will post some later.

I am aiming for maximum node count from the roots for flowering purpose.

Steve

Mike!!! I just saw your post and gardenia!!! Awesome pal! Thanks for sharing that..It looks very nice..What a good job you have been doing....

Steve, thank you

Wow pretty creative (but hope you have working smoke alarms!)

Thankfully my citrus protection is a sheet if it is really going to get cold.

So many smart ppl here love this place.

meyermike

Pictures are in
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Meiwa in branches all my trees are seed grown

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ngami with many branches and water spout

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Sweetlee tangerine bush, well branched

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Sweetlee #2 with branches

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Sweetlee #3 33" tall one branch

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35 inch tall swwetlee #4 single trunk just setting branches at top where I clipped the terminal growth bud to force branching

This post was edited by poncirusguy on Sat, Oct 26, 13 at 23:01

poncirusguy love light buckets my tree are getting use to my lightbuckets and are now taken off growing :-). A lot of my trees are baby's so next year should have some nice ones. Thanks for lightbicket ideas.

Steve, what a great idea!! I am still keeping my father away from this one..lol
My Mother says that I better not let him see this or he'll have buckets all over the house too...lol

What lights exactly are you using? Can you show us a picture of the actual light unless you did and I missed it..
Where did you but them unless I missed that too...I have a pounding headache to look up thread for it...
My sister is interested..ha

Tcamp..Are you growing some on your porch and some in those buckets and why both?
You live in an area where consistent growth is fantastic without lights...Are you not closer to Florida than my area where lights are used for the same results for some?

MIke

mike

I use what ever I can find in garbage cans on collection night.

Some fixtures are hanging globe lamps I remove the glass part and cut a hole in the bucket bottom to press fit the fixture in. I then silicon caulk it in place. Screw in a compact florescent light bulb. I get about 3 of these and wire nut them to a cord that has a plug on it. Broken lamps come complete with a threaded hollow rod . just drill a hole in the bucket bottom insert and away you go. It already has its own plug. Out door spotlight fixture use a 7/16 inch hole, slip it through, nut it on with the supplied nut . Attach 3 of these to a salvaged trashed appliance cord with a plug .

I will be making some more soon I will get pictures of there in construction.

Steve

I have one big bucket useing as supplemental light to speed up growth. All of its on porch the extra light makes seedlings grow twice as fast. I put them in light box 12 hours every other day to speed up grouth mostly for the seedlings. I have two big trees most of my other trees are small or seedlings. Use to grow citrus when I lived in California. This is my first year growing in Georgia so had to start over with new trees.

I live right outside of Atlanta GA it still gets Cold here i have very good light without buckets. Just wanted to speed up growth.

That makes sense...

12 hours most certainly pushes growth to the limit!
i HOPE THEY LOVE IT..
Don't forget to create humidity while your porch is closed in...It feels so good..It even makes the cooler temps feel good all the while keeping the leaves and blooms on our trees nice and fresh....I wish I could do this all winter on mine...

I love that you are enjoying it...What's good is that you can spray water without ruing anything because the plastic will even protect your floors on that porch...

Steve, I get it...Pictures would be great since my sister is prodding me for you to post them.lol

Thanks and happy growing..

Mike

bucket light made from hanging globe light. Remove the globe and cut a hole so the socket and globe holder press fit through the bottom of bucket install the globe holding screws to keep the fixture from falling threw. Discard the glass globe and screw in the lightbulb

This post was edited by poncirusguy on Sun, Oct 27, 13 at 16:55

actual picture I could not find my jigsaw so I screw it into the plastic bucket. the hole should be bigger than the bulb base so that heat will not go into the plastic.

Steve

This post was edited by poncirusguy on Sun, Oct 27, 13 at 16:47

Outdoor light fixture mounts in a 1?/16 inch hole in bucket bottom

Steve

Steve. The outdoor lamp holders are 1/2.the socket is designed to get grounded when it connects to the metal box that it is intended to be installed in which you cant do when installing it to plastic. I'm an electrician and I have to say please be careful with your creations. I'm getting a bit nervous for you. Hopefully you are using GFCI protection.

Mike

Thanks mike

I am not an electrician andI would have never thought of that for light bulbs. Almost all the lights I get are 2 prong un-grounded .

I will ground them or use a GFCI

Steve

mksmth

I have decided to install a new breaker. Should it be an AFCI with a GFCI outlet where I plug in my citrus lighting systems or would you do something different electricly.

Thanks Steve

Steve

that all depends on the circuit the breaker is controlling. By code any circuit serving habitable room such as living rooms, bedrooms, parlors, basically everything in your home except for garages, unfinished basements and kitchen appliance circuits are now required to have AFCI.
Depending on what type of breaker panel you have an AFCI will cost $30-$50.
Honestly I would use either a GFCI outlet where you plug the lights into or by an extension cord with GFCI protection.
Just be sure the circuit serving the lights is properly grounded or a GFCI is pretty much useless.

mike

We only have a few winter nights most years that get into the upper teens or the 20s. I try to preserve fruit and protect young trees those nights by throwing a tarp over them. This frame works great to support the tarp. It's grey electrical conduit pipe. Drive a few pieces of re-bar or other smaller diameter stakes into the ground around your tree and fit the pipe over the stakes, and throw a tarp over it. Secure with bungee cords.

One year, when the temps got in the teens three nights in a row, I lit little votive candles and placed them under the tarp. Use your common sense here since your humidity, tree size, tarp material and so forth may be different from mine!

Very clever, John, and really excellent support, as it clear the canopy, so the tarp is not resting on the leaves. Doe the electrical conduit really bend that nicely and easily? How long are the two pieces, did you have the piece them together?

Patty S.

Patty, the stuff I used is 10 foot, 3/4-inch PVC electrical conduit pipe. It's grey, more flexible, and less brittle than the white PVC used for water lines. This pipe also has male and female ends so you can fit two pieces together without glue. I used it several years back to make arches over my fig tree to support bird netting. Drive a smaller diameter stake (like steel re-bar) into the ground and fit the ends of the pipe over the stake for support. Some of the folks up north may have to wait for a warm day if they need to bend the pipe in a tight curve for smaller trees. You might want to measure the length of the pipe once you get it to the length you need to arch over your tree...that's about how big your tarp or plastic will need to be to reach the ground on both sides :>) Thinking out loud here but I suppose you could buy some 3mil thickness clear plastic and wrap it around, leaving the top open. That could be left up through the winter and you could throw a cover over the top on really cold nights.

John

Do you need a conduit bender to keep it from kinking. If not do you have any tricks up your sleeve.

Steve