Orlando Lime Zone
The bag is Tahiti
Ask the nursery which lime is on the tag before you pay. Citrus Culture in the Home Landscape files Tahiti under acid fruits and says fruit can be picked any time of year from a bearing tree. Key lime, the West Indian type, is listed everbearing, seedy, and cold sensitive. They are different fruit. The grocery bag is almost always Tahiti. A Key lime pie recipe does not change what is hanging on the tree.
Tahiti is nearly seedless. Key lime carries several seeds. That is the kitchen test if the label is vague. Pick a Tahiti green. It does not need to turn yellow on the tree to be ready. A fruit that gives slightly and feels heavy for its size is the one to take.
Tender in January
A lime is more cold-tender than a sweet orange. The same UF/IFAS paper says frequency of freezing temperatures should drive the choice, and that where freezes come every few years the more tender types should be avoided. A Tahiti lime sits on the tender side of that sentence. If your lot has a history of hard nights, the honest answer is a different fruit, or a pot you can roll into the garage.
Full sun beats light shade for fruit. Home spacing is a minimum of 15 feet between trees. Keep the tree away from septic tanks and drain fields. Weeds and sod come out from under the canopy and off the trunk, because weeds against the bark invite foot rot. Mulch is not recommended around citrus. If the tree sits in a mulched bed, keep the mulch a foot from the trunk.
Of citrus in a Central Florida yard, a tender lime is the best case for a container. Use a pot with real drainage holes and one you can tip onto a dolly when it is full of wet soil. Do not trust a dwarf claim that is not printed on the nursery tag. For a tree already in the ground, a lightweight row cover is what gets thrown over a young plant on a freeze night. Get this. Anchor the edges so wind does not lift it off.
UF/IFAS Home Citrus is blunt that canker and citrus greening have reduced residential citrus across the state. Buy clean nursery stock. Take questions to the county Extension office.
In the kitchen, zest before you juice. A rasp zester takes the colored peel and leaves the bitter white layer. Get this. A dual-gear hand press gets more out of a lime than a fork will. Get this.
