Fruit trees prefer wood mulch to rock
Question: I live in the far western area of the Las Vegas Valley. I have a good-sized area covered with rock mulch. A flowering plum tree (soon to be removed) is struggling in this area. Can a Myer’s lemon tree do well in a rock mulch setting?
I would not recommend it. It might do OK for a few years, maybe three to five, and then it will start to take a dive. You will have much better luck if you can pull the rock away from fruit trees, including your flowering plum, perhaps 6 feet or so from the trunk, and putting down wood mulch instead of rock.
If you decide to plant some citrus, I would highly recommend adding a lot of compost to our desert soil at the time of planting. It is much more effective to mix it in the soil than it would be to try to add it to the soil after it has been planted.
Bob Morris is a professor emeritus in horticulture with the University of Nevada and can be reached at extremehort@aol.com. Visit his blog at xtremehorticulture.blogspot.com. For more gardening advice, check the Home section of Thursday’s Las Vegas Review-Journal.