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Citrus Fruit & Orchards Container Gardening

Is this normal for a lemon tree?

6 years ago

last modified: 6 years ago

A friend of mine gave me this 5 gallon Improved Meyer Lemon Tree yesterday as a present. Unfortunately, I have no experience in growing citrus.

What caught my eye immediately were the budding lemons. As you can see in the photos, the newly forming lemons and the pistils of the flowers are a deep purple, almost black color. I talked to someone who works at a nursery earlier today to see if this was normal and she said it’s very normal for lemons to grow with a dark purple color on the pistils and lemons and then turn green as the fruit begins to grow. Is this normal?

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Comments (4)

poncirusguy6b452xx
6 years ago
If the fruits grow then I will say yes. If the fruits drop I will say I don't know.
Dave in NoVA • N. Virginia • zone 7A
6 years ago
Usually on my citrus, when new fruits turn very light green or yellow, they are gonna drop off. If they remain a rich green, they may stay. I've not seen fruit this dark before. Time will tell.
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Meyermike(Zone 6a Ma.)
6 years ago
Some of my lemons in hot sun have started growing that dark. Should be fine)
Ken "Fruity Paws" (N-Va 7a)
6 years ago
I've got quite a bit of baby "lemon" fruit that color right now and for sure have had them like that previously. Since, my lemon tends to have an overload in fruit, I don't tend to keep track (other than the BB sized light yellow will always drop off). I will say that all the ones that seem to have stayed on the tree this year (through 3 20-30mph storms) all appear to purple BBs.

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