Tangerine Blossom Love
I’m not sure I’ve mentioned (only about 67 times)
how much I love having a little something in bloom. I love having a flower hanging off a plant.
They dangle and look rather cheerful, and they fragrance the air, and
they make me so happy. Last spring I
purchased a citrus tree, a tangerine tree to be exact. The Master Gardner told me it would be 2-3
years before it would bear fruit. I took
her home, and planted her in a large-ish pot, one that I thought would be good
for 4-5 years. Her loveliness graced my
deck all summer, I planted coleus and geraniums in the pot with her, she and
they thrived. Along came fall, and the
nip in the weather. I took her in and found
a sunny west window, a place that she would be able to see the weak winter
sunshine, and perhaps, while not thrive, survive our wicked winter. I shut the heat vent so as not to dry her out
too much. I left a straggly geranium and
a sickly looking coleus in the pot to keep her company on the long winter
nights. We made it through our winter
and into February….I spied small whitish balls all along her branches. They very quickly opened and I have the smell
of tangerine blossoms throughout the house……I can smell them as I walk down the
hall toward the bedroom she has been put in. I called the Master Gardner to ask how to pollinate
this tree, and he explained that I could take a cotton swab and go inside the
flowers and twist and go from flower to flower to pollinate. I did.
Now I wait. What will come of all
those blossoms?
