Growing our own

[Texas Ranger]

[Ljohnsaw]

Mandarin oranges?

[Texas Ranger]

Not sure what they are, wife bought the seedling on a whim at a green house.

[tule peak timber]

Vitamin C plant !

[caveman]

My friend that I work with is our citrus guru and he thought it looks a bit like an old Dancy Tangerine that is not getting enough sunlight.

[Texas Ranger]

Odds on Valencia

[Texas Ranger]

My wife, who keeps every piece of paper we generate, says it is a satsuma mandarin, I will stay with valencia, but hey, she has the deed to the tree. ;D
Ijohnsaw called it.

[Ljohnsaw]

Ljohnsaw called it.

The flat, almost concave, bottom gave it away.

[Don P]

It does look like my MIL's Satsuma down in the redneck Riviera, many moons ago. I miss that tree, we looked forward to a package of them with some marmalade made from them.

[caveman]

My guess was a Satsuma due to being able to see the wedges through the rind.  If it is a Satsuma, it will have some cold tolerance.  I would bet against a Valencia since they are oblong, dimpled like a golf ball and have six seeds or less.  They also ripen in the late spring or early summer (at least in these parts).  The Satsuma will have bright flesh when ripe and easy to peel by hand.  Regardless, if you have a good tasting citrus fruit that does not have greening, you are fortunate.

[WV Sawmiller]

   A little off track, but what is new about that, but while vacationing in S. Africa a few years ago we visited our private guides family vineyard near Capetown. He advised us the growers/nurseries there don't sell their plants - they lease them and the grower has to pay a commission on them for the life of the vine/tree. The grower files an annual report on how many trees died and they are taken off the lease and the grower is not required to keep paying rent for them. Growers are not allowed to graft or grow their own plants because each is patented and possession of a specified species without a proper lease agreement is a crime. Real different to the way we do business here. Just in case you were interested.

[Southside]

Not all that different really in some respects. Almost all soybean, corn, cotton and a bunch of other seed are PVP licensed these days.  Want to keep some seed back from your bumper crop of beans this year - two options, get caught and Monsanto will sue the underwear off your bottom side, (and yes they have folks that drive around and search out guys cleaning seed or fields they suspect are planted with "stolen" seed) or just pay full retail price to the dealer for the seed you grew and harvested yourself, it's all in the contract you sign when you buy the seed.  I suspect the same will come with trees at some point.  

[Don P]

That's what came to my mind. When we decided to allow corporations to patent life we really screwed up. I don't ascribe to conspiracy thinking, however...

During our occupation of Iraq part of our aid was giving them seed, patented seed. Bremer's order does not prevent a farmer from saving seed but it makes it illegal, just as here, for a farmer to save seed with patented genes. In natural pollination those genes from patented plants cross with native traditional plants rendering all seed patented and unsaveable. We have done the same thing with corn in Mexico. This also pollutes the original genome, we can never go back to the original plants to breed from if the need arises, they no longer exist in unadultered form. Wheat originally comes from Iraq, corn from Mexico. The man who controls food in the future is way above any government, control food and you control the world.