Matt Mattus

I'm often asked about how to grow citrus indoors or how to grow citrus in containers - and while I am hardly an expert on raising citrus fruit, I have been growing many citruses in pots since, well, when I was a kid. I did buy a rather expensive Mandarin orange that grows very edible and large mandarins, now trained as a sort of standard in a large tub, it's one of those citruses where I hate picking any fruit just because it looks so nice on the plant, but I've learned that picking fruit on all citrus is important especial;y if you want them to bloom again and on time. Once settled into a 14-24 inch pot a grafted citrus will remain in that pot for much of its lifetime, but any citrus you buy in a 2- 4-inch pot will need an upgrade to a larger pot almost immediately. I would move small citrus into an 8 or 10-inch pot as soon as I get home from the nursery, and then once that pot is pot bound, move it to the14 or 24-inch pot where it will stay for at least 5-10 years, with biannual refreshing the outer soil.

There are still endless lists of garden chores for those who garden where winter is mild - California, the Pacific coast, the British Isles, or the US south, but here in New England - winter gardening can often be defined by most people as dreaming and planning. I pot my pips (which have long roots) in deep, clay pots - only because I like how they look that way. You can trim the long roots down a bit with scissors if your pots are smaller or shallow, it doesn't make a big difference but it may delay flowering by a few weeks as new roots don't begin to emerge until after they bloom so It doesn't matter as I'll be tossing these once they have bloomed - potted in dirty, recycled crappy, used potting mix left over on the bench from some pots used in the garden last summer.

You know, for someone who may seem as perpetually busy as a woodchuck I am known to be as lazy as one too. Here it is - three weeks before my book Mastering The Art of Vegetable Gardening ships from Amazon, and I get a call from my publisher (who is thrilled with the presales already - thank God), but who reminded me that I haven't posted any social media about ordering my book on this blog