Citrus Tree - Planting & Care in Los Angeles
To ensure your new trees establish flawlessly and bear a heavy crop year after year, follow these expert care steps optimized for our Southern California environment:
- Sunlight Exposure: Citrus trees fuel fruit sweetness and sugar production through direct solar energy. Plant your tree in a location that receives a minimum of 6 to 8 hours of full, direct sunlight daily.
- Proper Spacing: Space trees roughly 10 to 15 feet apart for high-density home orchards. While standard trees can exceed 20 feet at maturity, they can easily be pruned to a manageable height of 9 to 15 feet for easier harvesting.
- Soil and Hole Preparation: Choose a planting site with excellent drainage. Dig a hole exactly as deep as the current root system and at least twice as wide.
- Backfilling and Nutrition: Position the tree in the hole and backfill the surrounding space using a blended mixture of your native soil and a high-quality planting mix fortified with washed sand and organic fertilizer.
- Establish a Watering Basin: Sculpt a wide soil basin around the outer root drip zone to catch and hold water. Water newly planted trees deeply 1 to 2 times a week during the active spring and summer growing seasons, ensuring the moisture thoroughly saturates the soil to full field capacity.