Looks very nice! Best of luck with it. I picked one up a couple of months ago, the nursery had them in both bush and a small tree form. I went with the small tree, will have to see how it turns out.

Thanks. I was only familiar with the grafted ones. I didn't even knew they grew bushy like this. It must be on its own roots and just putting up new suckers/trunks. This was my only choice so I'm good with it. Maybe I can try rooting one or air layer it or something to get more lol.

Looks like multiple trees to me. Just Fruits and Exotics is selling it. I noticed it a couple of days ago. If they have it, maybe other growers will get it too.

So pretty! Congratulations!

So do you think they just let a bunch of cuttings start together in the same pot or its individual seedlings?

It looks like it needs repotting as a lot of the roots are visible. I don't look forward to that because it is a thorny beast lol. I would have to wear gauntlet gloves and safety glasses.

I am wondering how the 'wild' Fingerlime trees in Australia look. A lot of stems, or like one stem but just bushy?

Often seen them in nurseries here but I've never taken much notice. Is there anything special with them or are mainly grown for the novelty value?

Here in the States, it probably is a novelty for some people. The inside of the fruit is not typical citrus. The texture is little balls/vesicules shaped kinda like caviar etc. They can be used in drinks like mojitos, gin n tonic, basically anything that goes with a lime flavor. Also used on seafood, for sushi, salads etc. I suppose you could put it on key lime pie lol.

The red fingerlime is red and the inside can be blushed red where the green is dark green outside and light yellow green inside. I heard there was a purple skinned one.

I guess if you had a bunch of them and you knew a fancy chef you could maybe sell them some lol.

I'm no expert but I hope that helps. Hopefully others can add some information.

It actually seems like it would be more useful than the Buddah's hand although there are some uses for the BH rind.

~Sjn

Thanks for the info Sjn. I'll keep a look out for them now. All I remember of them is they were small, prickly and had narrow leaves. Don't recall noticing the price. If they've still got them hopefully it's in interesting colours.

citrange2, Wow that's awesome that you got to go scouting for trees in Australia. I heard they grow as under story trees I the wild, so skinny at the bottom reaching to the light does make sense. So do you think these are a bunch of cuttings growing together in this pot?

~Sjn

They are either cuttings or possibly seedlings. They don't normally produce suckers from the roots, and if they did they would all be different sizes. It's a bit difficult to see in your photo because the growth is so dense, but it looks to me as if there were originally three cuttings about 6" tall. I think that if they were seedlings they would be much taller for stems of that thickness.

You could try separating them while swishing them about in a bucket of slightly warm water. You will certainly damage some roots, so there is a risk, but hopefully subsequent re-potting should quickly stimulate new growth.

Sjn, I checked the nursery, they had plants looking as bushy as yours but all from a single stem. Yours is probably a multiple planting, either cuttings or seedlings as suggested.

Citrange2, I liked your citrus website. Out of curiosity I checked out the C. gracilis along Sayer Road yesterday. There are only 13 plants left, 2 recently dead (no leaves but fine branches and spines still there), no flowering or fruiting, no sign of seedlings. From all the numbered marker tag pegs on the ground there must have been quite a lot more plants there originally.

Closely spaced bollards are placed along the road side of the site which seem to be effective protection. Weeds are a problem, especially Gamba Grass, Andropogon gayanus. Large dead Gamba Grass indicates they were sprayed with herbicide last year. If this wasn't done carefully it could explain the absence of seedlings.

tropicbreezent - glad you liked the website. Always good to find another interested contact in the Darwin area!

The Sayer Road Citrus gracilis are looked after by the local TENPS (Top End Native Plants Society). They have had expert advice and should know what they are doing, but, as you say, this group of plants still isn't really thriving. I suspect this may be partly due to the open conditions at the site - the other specimens I have seen were all in more forested conditions. The lack of seedlings is explained by the lack of seeds. As far as I know, no-one has yet found a seed in a C. gracilis fruit! I have a theory about that.

I don't suppose you ever drive down the road past Mataranka? I need someone to check on the plants there! I'm considering another trip from here in the UK, but I'm getting a bit too old for these long journeys and then wandering about by myself in the outback.

Hi Sultry I've never seen them multi stemmed so I would guess you have multiple trees. :)

Seedlings take a lot longer to produce as far as I know (10-15 years) as oposed to grafted (2/3) and I'm not sure about cuttings but I'd guess they'd produce a lot sooner. So if it were me I'd call the nursery and ask, so as I know when I might have fruit :)

Hope this helps

Citrange2 your website is pretty cool. Thank you for sharing. I'm a lot further south down towards Sydney.

I've got citrus australis, citrus glauca and a few varieties of microcitrus australasica. Only the latter has fruited so far. I didn't know some of the others existed and I love reading about native food so its been fun reading your website :)

citrange2, I spoke to one of the botanists at the local herbarium about those yesterday. This Thursday I'm raising the issue with TENPS as the project has 'fallen off the radar' and the site isn't being looked after. Weed spraying is most likely arranged by the local council. They engage contractors to do roadside spraying.

The former density of plants indicates that at some stage there must have been good fruiting and seeding. I suspect that the bush area further in from the fence line would have a lot more plants, TENPS may have previously checked it out. The ALA website shows the plants to be widespread although sparse. More likely it's a matter of being "data deficient" as they're fairly inconspicuous and not often noticed, or recognised.

I've been to Mataranka many times but at 400 kms away it's not on my regular route. Would be interesting to check out the site there though. Message me with your email address and I'll let you know how I go.

Tropicbreezent - I've sent you my e-mail via Houzz message system.

sultry_jasmine_nights : where did you get your red finger lime?

samsaraedu - many of us have been looking for the red version of the finger lime in the U.S. but the only place that I have seen them advertised is "Just Fruits and Exotics" nursery in Florida but they don't ship citrus outside of Florida.

https://www.justfruitsandexotics.com/JFE/product/australian-red-finger-lime-tree/

Thanks for the info.

Maybe I'll put one at my parents house down there. I just started re-doing their landscape with a peach and fig among the palms. The jack fruit I put in didn't make it but I started new seeds and I have a sunshine blue waiting. I can't wait for them to be able to get breakfast from the back yard like I do here.

sam, I got mine at Just fruits and Exotics. I saw a Red Fingerlime at a Home Depo a few months ago though. It was much larger and cheaper priced that the one I bought but since there were several in my pot Im not complaining lol. I think I saw fingerlimes at Logees online nursery at some point. Pretty sure they had the red kind. They cant ship to FL so that option was out for me.

I saw the logee also. Funny I see in the description for the green one it is a dense bushy shaped citrus and must fill the 6in pot to fruit, but then it says grafted to fruit sooner? What citrus is bushy and grafted at the same time?

sultry_jasmine_nights - Logee's corrected their description to be an "Australian Red Lime" versus the "Australian red finger lime". A number of us had bought one from there (including myself) thinking it was a "red finger lime" and it isn't. What they offer is also called an "Australian Red Centre/Center lime" or "Australian Blood lime". Technically it's a bit related to the finger lime because it's a cross between the finger lime and a rangpur lime (with similar tiny leaves and sprawling wild-growing thorny branches), but the fruit shape is different. The finger limes have a long narrow fruit and the red center/blood lime is more "lime shaped" but much smaller than regular limes. The vesicles are somewhat similar but the red center lime has more elongated sacs vs the true finger lime's bubble-like sacs.

samsaraedu - Logees has grafted these on what I believe is some dwarfing rootstock (appears to be a trifoliate like flying dragon") with the wild-growing stems stuck on the top of what will eventually be a short trunk.

My Australian red centre (blood) lime when I first got it from Logee's last summer -

Gardenweb · More Info

Here it is this past week -

Early stages of fruit -

I saw the 2 different descriptions for limes. The red is just red lime, but the green says finger is what I was pointing out about being bushy and grafted.

They aren't forth coming with rootstock info either since I bought a fuyu persimmon from them that came with problems, struggled for 3yrs til graft died. I now have unknown something rootstock growing in a pot non-productive. If I purchase from them again it would have to be in person so I could inspect carefully.

I actually like the way that plain red center lime looks. I wonder why its more expensive than green finger lime?

I wonder why mine hasn’t produced fruit yet

samsaraedu - There is a thread here in this forum on the "red lime". There is actually a "red lime" which is different from the "red center lime" which is different from the "red finger lime". lol The Australian red center lime has finger lime heritage where the regular red lime doesn't. The one on the regular "red lime" is here.

There's a good explanation of the different ones in this thread. In that thread I summarized -

In summary -

The generic "red lime" appears to be this (or similar) - http://www.citrusvariety.ucr.edu/citrus/excalibur.html

The "blood/red centre lime" appears to be this - http://www.homecitrusgrowers.co.uk/australiannativecitrus/bloodlime.html

And Saltysea mentioned the finger lime, where no one can find the red
varieties here in the U.S. (at least yet). Vendors are mainly selling
the green one (with clear vesicles) - http://www.citrusvariety.ucr.edu/citrus/microcitrus_australasica_3672.html

In other words - Citrus x limonia or Citrus x aurantiifolia (Rangpur or Red lime), Citrus Australasica (Red finger lime), Citrus x aurantiifolia X Citrus x limonia (Red Centre/Center/Blood lime). Ha!

I guess I'll just have to forego the lime in the landscape. I don't want to give my parents something that will be a headache if its the wrong one.

sultry thanks for the beautiful pix of such a thick healthy lime.

Unlike most citrus, finger limes will only fruit if given the bare minimum of fertilizer. They are not heavy feeders.

I just checked Just Fruits and Exotics' website and they have 21 red Australian finger limes in stock. They have been out of stock for a while now. Wish I lived closer so I could get one.

Jenny thanks for the clarification on the two different Red Limes!! That's important information!

I used to have a green fingerlime. I did get a few fruit from it. They were smaller than those I've seen online but it was still a small plant. It was grafted to flying dragon. I treated it the same as my other citrus but gave it a tiny bit more shade. I tried more filtered shade but it was happier w just a little afternoon shade. The fruits tasted sweet and limey like little bubbles of juice. Probably go great on fish tacos or tostadas or like a topping on the key lime pies or margaritas lol.