How to properly plant a lemon at home so that it bears fruit?

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Lemon is a heat-loving perennial tree that can be grown at home. Such a citrus crop, planted at room temperature from a stone, will always delight the eye with its evergreen leaves.

But in order to get fragrant yellow fruits, it is necessary to plant the plant correctly.

Features and conditions of vaccination

Growing a lemon at home is an easy process.This requires high-quality material for planting, a container with earth and good care for the culture. Compliance with all the conditions necessary for growth will provide an opportunity to grow a beautiful citrus tree with strong fleshy leaves. It may begin to bear fruit in no less than seven years.

Get useful fruits can be much faster if you plant a culture, choosing the appropriate option. This procedure will allow you to get the first harvest in three years. Some lemon varieties can produce fruit in the first year after grafting.

Vaccination is the movement of shoots or buds from one selected plant to another for full fusion. This action must be performed one year after planting, when a strong green stem will sprout from a bone.

The best period for transplanting buds or shoots is the middle of spring. At this time, the plant comes the moment of increasing the activity of all the processes necessary for life. If necessary, you can graft lemon at home in August.

How to pick a stock?

For the effectiveness of the vaccination result, a high-quality stock should be selected - a culture to be planted.A good mother plant will be a sprout grown from a seed with a diameter of half a centimeter.

Strong seedlings of such citrus crops as grapefruit, orange and lemon are often used as rootstocks. When choosing a plant for vaccination, one should take into account the distinctive characteristics of the plant - growth, taste, and propensity for diseases.

Before the engraftment process, several small lemon branches are harvested. Such a graft - the material that is grafted on the mother seedling, should be taken only fruiting plants. Scions are cleared of thorns and leaves. Only embryonic shoots and scapes should remain on the branches.

Home Lemon Grafting Techniques

For grafting citrus culture, several vaccination options are used:

1. Cuttings. This method can be applied in the spring and summer. It is carried out with the help of branches with a certain number of leaves. You can perform two cuttings - "behind the bark" and "split"
2. Copulation. In the process of grafting, the stock is used and the part grafted onto it with the same thickness. Such a connection with cuttings is simple and advanced.
3. Budding. This method of vaccination is the most common. The deadline is April and May. For budding, a single kidney with a thin woody coating is used, which is selected from the stalk of a cultivated plant. Such a peephole is inserted into the bark of the stock.

A month before vaccination, it is necessary to check the condition of the roots of the crop and, if necessary, replace the soil.

How to graft cutting?

In early spring, the plant comes the revival of all life processes. A tree actively grows branches and leaves, which are good material for cuttings.

Grafting a lemon with the help of a young scion is done in several stages:

• the stock cleared of dust is cut horizontally at a height of five centimeters from the ground;
• vertical splitting is performed to a depth of two centimeters of the main stem;
• at the bottom of the cutting, an oblique cut is made equal to the notch on the stem;
• the stem at the end with the bud is inserted into the incision;
• graft, which entered the incision, gently pressed down against the stem;
• junction carefully wrapped with plastic tape;
• The cut on the stem is coated with a special garden pitch.

Such a grafting by grafting is called “behind the bark”.

Engraftment cutting "splintering" is performed a little differently:

• the whole bark is cut from the stem at a distance of seven centimeters;
• the remaining stock is divided in half with a sharp knife to a depth of two to four centimeters;
• the base of the cutting obliquely cut from opposite sides;
• a graft is inserted into the incision, on which there must be at least three kidneys;
• The grafting area is wound with a film material.

For effective grafting, it is necessary that the bark of the scion and rootstock be pressed during the winding.

A container with a grafted citrus tree is placed in a warm place where regular airing should be carried out. When the yellowed petioles begin to fall off, the dressing should be slightly dispersed, and with the active development of the kidneys, it is completely removed.

Copulation

This method of vaccination should be carried out during the calm of the plant, which occurs in the winter. It is also possible to carry out copulation in early spring until the buds begin to appear.

This vaccination is one of the common variants of grafting. Making it pretty simple:

• stock and graft are selected with the same thickness;
• identical oblique cuts are made on the stem of the mother plant and the cutting;
• cut surfaces are combined with each other;
• place docking neatly rewound tape.

The winding should be done very carefully, the matched pressed sections are not shifted. With the right combination, sticking a stalk will come to life after a while, sprouting. If such signs appear, remove the dressing.

How to instill lemon at home so that it fructifies by budding?

Buds or eye buds are the easiest way to graft with cuttings. This process can be performed from mid-spring to late August. During this period, the plant begins active sap flow. In spring, a germinated eye is selected for grafting, and at the end of the summer, the material is used in a dormant state.

For a scion, you need to cut off the shoot with a kidney with a clean, sharp knife and make two cuts horizontally. The first is one centimeter above the bud, the second one is one and a half centimeter lower than the rudimentary shoot.

For engraftment cuttings by budding, you need:

• on the bark of a well-cleaned stock, make an incision in the shape of the letter “T”;
• angle in the crust, formed as a result of the incision, slightly bend;
• put the prepared graft into the formed slot;
• the vaccination site is wrapped with tape so that the kidney itself remains open;
• the surface where the vaccination was carried out is covered with garden pitch.

The grafted plant is covered with a plastic bottle or plastic bag to create a greenhouse effect. In the process of accretion of the scion and rootstock perform regular airing and carry out the removal of unwanted shoots.

The connecting bandage and greenhouse cover is removed after a month. If budding is successful, then the cutting should fall off, leaving only an eye on the stem. The stock is cut at a distance of ten centimeters from the grafted bud.

To achieve the best result, you should follow some guidelines from practicing gardeners:

• absolute sterility of the whole process;
• all cuts should be made with a sharp, well-ground knife;
• for rootstock use healthy strong plants;
• remove the extra shoots after the vaccination on the stem;
• before vaccination for several days watering the rootstock abundantly;
• after grafting use a greenhouse, which should be regularly ventilated;
• to moisten the soil in a mini-greenhouse, using a cotton swab moistened with water.

After a successful accretion, the young grafted branch is tied to the stem in a horizontal position. The grafted citrus plant should be constantly watered to prevent drying out of the soil.

Plant a lemon at home and, over time, get the first harvest for everyone. For a fruitful result, it is necessary to choose a method of vaccination, and to carry out the process correctly.