And summer is gone! 17/09/2017

Well, i didn't post any update during this summer but as you can see the tree is still alive and it grew even more. In fact a brand new branches emerged from the bottom part and became bigger than the rest of the tree! This unexpected event changed my plan to put it on the ground because i think that maybe if it doesn't acclimatate well now with the growth so strong and fresh, i could make some serious damage. Therefore I've decided to transfer it in a bigger vase and I will do around mid october.
For the weather we had the most hot and dry summer ever here with no rain at all for almost 3 months, but now things are changed and the temperature are around 20°C and we are having some rainy days.

Almost Summer! 16/06/2017

Ok, first of ll sorry for the photo here but I am too lazy to take the tree to a nice spot. However as you can see it is doing very well. I was a little bit worried for the hailstorm of last month but seems that the event didn't had any effect at all.
I've also got rid of most of the weeds in the pot, except for a nice shaped one that seems to be a flower of some kind, and added some new fresh soil to see if this help with the yellow leaves in the bottom part.
Some people suggest me to prune it a little bit but I want to wait the transplantation on the ground.
The weather now is really hot with very few cloudy days, no rain and the temperature is constantly over 30°.

Started to grow again! 02/04/2017

Finally spring is arrived and the sun shine almost everyday. The tree seems to enjoy it and a lot of new branches popped up everywhere!
The bottom part start to look a bit messed up but i like that the tree grow wild at least for now. Maybe next year a pruning will be necessary but we will see how it become. For now I'm very happy of how it is coming along. However this is definitly its last spring in a vase because i want to put it in the ground but, with this active germination, I am scared to hurt the roots so i will probably plant it at the beginning of next spring.

Spring is coming! 26/02/2017

At the beginning of 2017 we had the biggest snowfall ever here and we had a lot of problem with several days without electricity, no phone signal, few strong earthquakes and it was impossible to go anywhere. Luckily the tree was in the greenhouse and it didn't had many problems as we had even if I think that the lack of sunlight and the cold temperature had some impact on it because some leaves fell off and the yellow color on the bottom part seems increased.

However two weeks ago I've decided to move the tree outside the greenhouse because the sun is now shining almost everyday. I am a bit concerned of the night hours because occasionally the temperature still drop below zero, but I think that the tree can manage a weather like this now. I also want that the trunk become a little bit stronger therefore I've removed most of the support sticks hoping that the tree will get used to the wind.

Not a great period! 27/11/2016

Tough times for my tree in this period. Few weeks ago we had a couple of days of strong wind and the tree was knocked down and lost some leaves. Other than that the cold season is approccing and so i've decided to move back the tree in the greenhouse. Days are still sunny and warm but in the night the temperature drop a lot.
But bad news are not finished since some snails decided to eat some leaves of my tree.
In the greenhouse the tree is more protected from the wind and the cold but it receive less sunlight so I've removed some old sticks to help the sun especially in the lower part were there are still a lot of yellow leaves.

Almost autumn! 16/10/2016

The sky is becoming more cloudy and the days are gloomy but the tree don't really care. The summer make it grow a lot and now it is almost tall as me. In the current position it became difficult for to take an entire picture of it.
However in the cold season the growth should be much slower and it might be the right time to search a new and bigger vase where the roots can have more space. However i have no real plan about that at the moment. I also have to think about a new location because here the tree can enjoy some raindrops but it might be a problem when the real cold will began.
From the tree health side the leaves at the bottom are still yellow but I don't really think that it is a huge problem.

Summer! 19/07/2016

Finally it is the time for a new update.

Sorry for the photo but, due to the sunlight, you can't really see the top of the tree. However this means that it keeps growing and growing. You can't really confront this photo with the one of the Spring update because we changed the position of the various vases but consider that shortly after that update I've added the longest wooden support that you can see in this photo that was perfect for the previous size of the tree. Now is definitly too short and i need to change it.
As you can see there are some yellowish leaves around the bottom and internet say that could be a lack of iron in the ground. I've added a bit of powder recilcled from a used heating pack. Hope that it can help, however i'm not too worried about that.
The summer until now has been pretty wet and we had several hailstorm. But the tree held them pretty well. Now seems that the sun has finally took back his spot in the season and we have just sunny and hot days.

See you soon and have a great summer!

Spring is here! 11/04/2016

Well, in the last post I said that i would update this blog more often. This doesn't happened and we skipped all the winter. However if you were worried about the health of the tree here it is the new update!
It is still in great shape even if some insects has bitten some leaves in the middle section of the tree. Nothing to be worried about. Overall I can say that it survived perfectly at the cold season (that this year was actually not cold at all).
Now the days are mainly warm and sunny and the tree seems to become bigger and bigger everyday.
I've also bought a new smartphone and that means that now the photos should be a little bit better than before.
See you soon (or not too soon, we will see...)

Not a lemon! 20/11/2015

Finally I'm at home in Abruzzo and I can write some update of my tree! As you can see it is grown a lot since the last update. This first half of November was sunny and warm and the tree is having a great time.
However the big news is that I now what kind of tree it is!
Looking closely to the image you can see few spikes on the trunk (and my finger in the right corner). When i was planting the i used a lot of different seeds at the beginning but the only tree that has spike is the Bitter Orange. That is a little bit disappointing because the fruits of this tree are not really good to eat, but the full growth tree looks great and in a second time I can try to insert a graft of a sweet orange tree to make the fruits tasty!