Citrus - Lemon Meyer Citrus limon

The Riverside collection files Meyer under the lemon's botanical name, and the citrus page carries the Missouri Plant Finder's culture for the lemon species: sun, shelter from wind, fertile well-drained soil, water and small feeds of nitrogen through the growing season, very little pruning. No reference read gives culture for Meyer itself.

What the collection, a Californian reference, says of the tree: moderately vigorous and cold hardy, shrubby, relatively small at maturity, flowering intermittently through the year and mainly in spring, with the crop at Riverside spread somewhat through the year but mainly in winter. The 1967 description it quotes calls the tree spreading, nearly thornless, hardy and productive, says it compares favourably with the sweet orange for resistance to both cold and heat and so has a much wider range of climatic adaptation than the common lemon or the lime. The original introductions carried the tristeza virus without symptoms; the collection says the Improved Meyer trees now available are virus-free. No height, no frost figure and no Australian climate zones were found, and the seasons given are California's. The Atlas holds only a name entry for the lemon, with no state records or status, so the status of exotic rests on the collection's account of a plant found near Beijing; no Australian reference was read for it.

The 1967 description the Riverside collection quotes records Meyer as one of the most widely used citrus fruits as a dooryard plant, especially suited to growing potted or tubbed, and the collection's own notes call it an attractive garden tree. The same description says it is acceptable as a lemon substitute for home use but did not prove satisfactory for the fresh-fruit trade, because fruit so tender and juicy does not stand up to handling, shipping and storage. The HortOS community garden cost guide lists the Meyer lemon in its table of plants. The lemons with their own pages are Eureka and Lisbon.

The table above shows the sizes growers list; the community garden cost guide gives a 200 mm pot as the size the most growers price for Meyer. For roots and pests see the HortOS guide to judging nursery plant quality. Stock that crosses a state border moves under the state and territory biosecurity rules; the HortOS guide to buying from a wholesale grower says nursery stock moving interstate may need a plant health certificate. The gap the sources leave is a size in metres: the collection says only relatively small at maturity, and the description it quotes small to medium, so ask the grower what their stock reaches.