So, you want to grow your orchard of seedless navel oranges. The good news is that it’s not that hard. Seedless Navel oranges are delicious fruits you can enjoy all year long. They’re easy to grow, but they’re often not seedless, which means you’ll need to use a different type of citrus tree and netting to get the seedless variant.
If you have a very large orchard, then you can hire skilled workers to do all of the work for you. Whichever the case, you will need to plant the suitable types of oranges and follow the proper steps to produce seedless oranges.
Navel oranges are a delicious fruit you can enjoy all year long. They’re easy to grow, but they’re often not seedless, which means you’ll need to use a different type of citrus tree. This article will teach you how to propagate seedless navel oranges from cuttings and grafting.
What’s Grafting
Grafting is the process by which two plants are combined into one plant. This produces a more vigorous plant with the best qualities of both plants. If you don’t want to graft your navel oranges, you can also root them in water or soak them in water for about 24 hours before sticking them into the ground. Either way, it’s essential to wait until winter before planting any citrus tree outside so it can adjust to the temperature change.
Propagating seedless navel oranges is not as hard as it seems. You can take a few easy steps to grow your seedless navel oranges, and you don’t need a green thumb to do so. The first step is to plan.
Like all plants, seedless navel oranges need water, sunlight, and soil before they can thrive. It would be best to prepare at the beginning of the season by giving your plant a lot of space and a warm environment. This will give it enough time to develop its roots and become strong. Now that your plant is situated in its new home, it’s time to start propagating! In the next section, we’ll go over how to propagate seedless navel oranges step-by-step.
The most affordable way of growing navel orange trees is by getting cuttings from your friendly neighbors who already have healthy orange trees. Remember, navel oranges contain no seeds naturally. As a result, grafting and rooting are the only viable options for developing new healthy trees from cuttings off a well-established tree.
The fruits are seedless because navel orange blossoms do not produce viable pollen or ovules. As a result, it cannot procreate by seed or pollinate other citrus orange trees. Growers propagate them by grafting navel orange tree stock onto the rootstock of another healthy orange tree, giving it a root system from which to grow. So, what does the grafting process entail? Let’s see.
Grafting
Grafting is used on many different fruit trees to capitalize on the desirable characteristics of different varieties of the similar fruit, or in navel orange’s case, to reproduce the coveted seedless fruit.
You have to graft a navel orange-producing branch onto other vibrant orange tree stock. The navel orange piece, known as the scion, will connect with the new tree’s root system, and the grafted tree will produce seedless navel oranges, which is what you want.
How to Determine the Best Time to Take the Cuttings
Tree cuttings have the best chance of success when they are a little bit soft. To determine if the cutting is ideal for you, attempt to snap the first-year branch gently. If the chosen branch bends slightly and fails to break, it’s way too young to make a good cutting.
However, if you try to break a branch and it snaps without bending even a little, it’s too mature hence not a good fit for your project. The suitable branches for propagating are the ones that bend before breaking. They are at the best age for producing fresh navel orange trees.
How to Root Your Cutting Like a Pro
Ensure your cutting is eight inches long. Gently remove the leaves on the bottom half of the branch. Make sure not to injure the cutting when removing the leaves. Slowly cut the edge of your branch in a sharp-pointed shape. Dip the sharp edge of your cutting into your favorite rooting hormone powder.
Bury it ( the cutting) in a shallow hole in humid sand in a small pot. Plant a few branches in the pool to boost the odds in your favor. Water the sand extensively and put the pot in a high-quality plastic bag to keep the sand damp as long as you need to. Ensure the sand is always moist. After eight short weeks ( two months), check to see if your cuttings have started to grow roots.
After each stem has formed a robust root system, replant it with the ideal potting soil.
Now that you have rooted the cutting, here’s how to graft the cutting.
Grafting Cuttings
Make a 45-degree cut at the stem’s bottom. Slit the trunk of a young well-established orange tree at 45 degrees and slide the scion ( the branch) into the slit in the orange trunk. Be sure to match up the surfaces. After matching up the characters, it’s time to wrap the now two pieces together with grafting tape to keep them together as long as you have to securely.
Remove the grafting tape once the graft has started to grow, not impede growth.
A Point to Ponder
It would be best if you had citrus netting for the successful production of seedless navel oranges.
There are many reasons why you might need to use citrus bee netting in seedless navel orange production.
What’s a Citrus Netting?
Citrus netting comprises nylon mesh with small holes, and it blocks flying pests like bees, wasps, fruit flies, and fruit-piercing insects. These cross-pollinate your navel oranges leading to seeds. The pests also wreak havoc on your fruit farm, significantly reducing the yield.
How it Works
Citrus netting has a high exclusion rate. The pest gets blocked by the netting, preventing them from getting into your fruit. This method can be applied to citrus trees close to each other or trees far apart. There are various ways to put up your citrus bee netting:
- Single row drape
- Multi-row drape
- Side netting
If you have any further questions about these pests or how to set up your citrus netting, please feel free to contact us. We’re just a text or a phone call away. We’ll be glad to serve you.
Conclusion
Now that you know the different ways you can propagate seedless navel oranges, it’s just a matter of choosing which method is right for you. the methods of propagation will only yield satisfactory results if you have already selected healthy seedlings as donors. you will have to keep the seedlings with their parents until they become productive and can bear fruit themselves.
Citrus netting from Eyouagro is tailored to your location, fruit, and type. We want you to be able to harvest a high-quality crop. In the realm of citrus bee netting, Eyouagro is a market leader. All of the fruits are shielded by our netting covers. Contact us at info@eyouagro.com to learn more about the appropriate netting for your needs.
