Fallen leaf

Dying branch

More dying branches 😭

Flush several times again to see if it arrests the deterioration. How much dyna-gro did you add? Did you flush after adding or just left it there?

I'd check the roots to see if there are viable ones left. If there is, cut off the dead ones and soak the roots as you wash all the soil away. Bare root 911 and I wouldn't care if it is winter. Fresh soil mix and clean roots might spare it. That is what I have done actually and survived a many plant.

You are not dumb and in fact helpful. You just showed everyone here who bothers to care just what over fertilized trees look like and what can happen. Good luck

I mean, seriously, I'm with Myermike above...how much did you add? Normal amounts should have diluted themselves pretty well on the way through just fine (sure, there's a heftier wave at first, but..) I've done the same in a pinch, and I've also simply sprinkled a tiny bit of pure urea (46-0-0) on the soil at times. It doesn't get any more concentrated than that. The plants are fine if you water enough.

Just flush and re-flush. As long as enough living root remains, the tree may very well recover. I'm not thrilled with the phosphorus levels constantly added to the plant, so after this P dump, if it's nearly repotting time for your tree, I'd do it this summer.

Glad I can serve as a lesson for us all haha ugh! I probably added a 1/4 cup while under the shower and then let it get flushed for about a minute or 2. I flushed it a second time for about 2-3 minutes once I saw it deteriorating a week later. Haven’t watered since which is about another week now. I’m going to keep a close eye on it before I totally repot and access the roots as I’m nervous about making it more upset. Think I should let my lone baby lemon hang on itself or should I speed up the inevitable and take it off now to help with new leaf growth?

Oh and should I keep pruning off the dead branches? I’m scared now since I already snipped one and it just continued to die back

Take the fruit off. There is nothing left to feed it. Sterilize your tools to prune after each cut - a quick dip in rubbing alcohol full strength should be good enough. A weak plant is far more susceptible to infection.

"I probably added a 1/4 cup while under the shower and then let it get flushed for about a minute or 2"

OK, that's...like...a lot Like 12 times normal. Dyna-Gro is around 1 tsp per gallon of water when watering the plant.

However, a quarter cup is not necessarily automatically fatal. But it's sure a kick in the pants. While the stuff is low in salts, it's still not that low. Nitrates and ammoniacal nitrogen (as Dyna-Gro has) are both salts and both quickly available.

But you did flush, and showers are around 2 GPM at water-saving flow rates. If water was running out of the bottom at the time, it did help, and the most concentrated feed would be running out first (simple dilution principle and the salt part isn't instantly soil-binding).

For now...withhold feeding. You've completely overdone it. :-) P and K are at high levels in the soil and will remain there for months if not forever (P does not leach easily, K does leach more easily), and a lot of micro-nutrients are now out of whack as well.

I'd definitely say repot in fresh soil if the tree survives. If it does survive, summer's still fine, but I'd withhold anything but nitrogen feeding (which leaves the soil easily when flushed) until that time. P, K, and micros won't be necessary until then.

As for the lemon, if it makes you feel good, leave it. It would be slightly better for the plant to remove it, but it's really not sucking up that much in terms of energy and if the plant wants it gone, it will be gone soon enough anyway.

One thing I might suggest is bright secondary light in the evenings if possible. Any source you can manage is fine, but a good, bright LED of any type would be best. Just bathe the plant to give it any level of extra energy you can and as much as you can for as long as you can. 18 hours a day total wouldn't be too much.

Not that, say, 10 watts of LED lighting would be all that significant, but if you could manage 25 watts for an extra 10 hours, it might help kick some leaf growth along until April arrives. Then again, ask me what I can do with 10 watts...

"Oh and should I keep pruning off the dead branches? I’m scared now since I already snipped one and it just continued to die back"

You can if you wish, certainly. Dead wood can always be removed from any tree or plant, along with dead leaves. In this instance, I'd say not to cut back into living wood as the tree has to expend the energy to seal the cut. It just doesn't have a lot of spare energy right now.

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BTW: 1/4 cup is 12 tsp. The recommended max for Foliage Pro is 1 tsp per gallon of water. So that is quite strong. During growing season you can go higher than recommended though like 2-3X.

Yes, I am very aware how much I over did it. Like I said, I have no idea what I was thinking. It just happened so fast without thinking. Things like this tend to happen the second we get too confident. I really should know better. 10+ years in healthcare and lab work should have this ingrained in my brain by now. Oh well, we live (well probably not this lemon tree) and we learn. I’ll take this with me for round 4 of growing a meyer lemon. In the meantime, it will be in the light ICU. Thanks for all of the advice and support :)

You have a great attitude. Sometimes we do things that are results of our own over confidence. I did not mean to rub it in - just stating what came to my mind. We all lose plants for one reason or the other. Let this be an example for all of us.

@morpheuspa you think the P & K are able to absorb and stay put even with 2 flushings in the 511 mix? I was always under the assumption that’s part of the reason why some fertilize (even at 1/2 rate) with every watering. Maybe this wasn’t as bad? I mean I’m looking at the remains of this tree so I’m probably wrong just thinking about that lol

@tropicofcancer thanks! I haven’t always had such a good attitude about these things but have learned these things are kind of a part of the process to success. Especially when you live in Chicago during the winter. And no worries, I deserved it :P

Potassium will wash out with flushing the medium with water, so will nitrogen. Phosphorous will flush away, but will require much more flushing. Of course you can always repot with new medium. According to research given in the text book The Genus Citrus, citrus absorb nutrients in the ratio 5-1-3. Citrus requires much more nitrogen and potassium and much less phosphorous. 25-5-15 as provided by Jacks Professional water soluble fertilizer, and also Foliage Pro is close enough to a 5-1-3. Both are very good fertilizer's for container citrus trees. The best to you and your trees.

"@morpheuspa you think the P & K are able to absorb and stay put even with 2 flushings in the 511 mix?"

Yep. P doesn't perk; it soil binds extremely firmly and heads through at about a quarter inch a year. K does perk, but at a very much slower rate than N. That's why we slow-meter this stuff. :-)

P is of somewhat less concern than some will have you think it is (seriously, people go into hysterics. But it is very much a water pollutant and every soil change is a potential source of pollution). K doesn't concern me too much except in the sense that overapplication can burn initially.

Micro-elements vary from copper, molybdenum, and manganese (practically as durable as P) to boron (about the same as K). Most micros are at low enough levels but...you kind of shot 12x the normal rates into the soil. I still wouldn't go into hysterics about anything, these still being within normal app rates, though--as long as the soil wasn't already high in any of the micros already, that is.

So at this point, if the tree makes it and recovers and does well in spring, change the soil in June or early July. Personally, I'd break that and do it in spring, but people yell at me as soon as I recommend moving trees out of slightly toxic environments at the wrong times due to considerations of things like "toxicity." :-) I don't believe in making the ion pumps in the cells work harder than they have to.

Most forms of N (with a negative or neutral charge) flush easily. Ammonium will bind, and Dyna-Gro does contain ammoniacal N, but only 2.6%. Even at 12 tsp, 0.3 tsp of binding N is not significant enough to be a major issue in and of itself when dissolved in 2 gallons of water.

I'm writing a friggin' book here, but what wigs me about this stuff is their 0.1% sodium. Sodium is useless, incredibly strongly soil-binding, hard to dispel without some special work, and damaging to plants. At least they include some calcium, which will help to get rid of the damage they're allowing by including useless sodium in their mix...if the person regularly flushes out their plant. If.

"Potassium will wash out with flushing the medium with water, so will nitrogen. Phosphorous will flush away, but will require much more flushing."

Alas, it will not. The organic component of the soil, be it peat or compost, will happily trap K. https://www.nofa.org/soil/html/potassium.php#:~:text=It%20is%20the%20only%20nutrient,by%20trapping%20within%20clay%20crystals.

P mobility is practically zero in soils, but you can increase it by using a near-zero EC soil.

https://www.nrcs.usda.gov/Internet/FSE_DOCUMENTS/nrcs142p2_053254.pdf

https://www.oieau.org/eaudoc/system/files/documents/38/194379/194379_doc.pdf

http://www.eeer.org/journal/view.php?number=1200

https://repository.rothamsted.ac.uk/item/87319/phosphorus-leaching-from-soils-containing-different-phosphorus-concentrations-in-the-broadbalk-experiment

The best advice, as always, is to test a soil before adding fertilizer. That's tough in pots, so following the 5-1-3 rule is...acceptable, I suppose, if one must. It's not something I do in my gardens (where the soil test rules).

In pots, I tend to follow a more (you should pardon the pun) organic rule where I add measured amounts of P and K rather than feed with it every time. This avoids the issue where my soils become water pollutants every time they're discarded, although the pot soil is always on the low end of acceptable P. (K is not a water pollutant and need not be monitored nearly as closely).

I appreciate the mini chemistry lesson :) But all I got from that was “add calcium” hahaha there’s my desperation kicking in. I’m gonna let it do it’s thing for at least 3 months. Might get crazy and flush it again next time I water but that’s about it.

Hands off. :-) While it wouldn't do any major harm and react very slowly, it wouldn't help. And in the middling/long term, it would send the soil pH up. Citrus prefer a pH of 6-7.

And there are two types of limestone; one contains far too much magnesium and would make everything worse. :-)

Your best bet is, when the tree gets dry, is to flush it again. Other than that, light, care, love.

I’m still gonna mist her once or twice a day just to feel like a good mom haha