Sabrina Hahn’s guide to growing your own oranges

Do you have a question for Sabrina Hahn? To submit a question to Green With Envy, inside Saturday’s The West Australian and online at thewest.com.au, write to Ask Sabrina, GPO Box D162, Perth, 6001 or email home@wanews.com.au. Please include your full name and suburb. Due to the volume of questions, not all of them will be answered. Wintertime is orange season and freshly picked fruit squeezed fresh off the tree is a true seasonal delight. Another bonus with orange trees is the highly perfumed blossom that fills the garden with one of the best scents in the world. Orange trees have a multitude of uses and are a versatile evergreen small tree. They make wonderful screens and hedges, growing from 2-7m high, depending on the rootstock they are grafted on. Most fruit trees can be purchased on dwarf rootstock these days and oranges are no exception. That’s great news for people who can only grow in pots, or for smaller courtyard gardens. France and Italy have been growing oranges in pots for centuries, building special hothouses to store them over winter. Citrus dates back centuries and was considered a medicinal plant as well as culinary. Eight of the best orange cultivars to try Atwood is a sport of the Washington navel and is ready for harvest early to mid-season from May to August. Lanes Late navel has very large seedless fruit that is sweet and juicy. Fruit matures later, from September through to December. Leng navel ripens earlier than the Washington with thinner skin. The fruit ripens May through to September. Washington navel is by far the most popular with rich, sweet, deep-orange coloured flesh and an easy peeling skin. It ripens from May to September. Navelina originated in Spain and has been grown in Australia since 1980. It is a sport of the Washington navel with seedless mid-season fruit. Blood orange Cara Cara Red and Rosy Red are sports of the navel and arrived from Europe. They are incredibly juicy and sweet, ripening about the same time as Washington navel oranges from May to August. Valencia oranges are sweet and juicy and will bear from September through to December. The tree will have flowers and fruit on it all year. It is one of the most climate- adaptable oranges to grow. Midnight seedless Valencia has sweet juicy fruit that is harvested in summer, filling in the gap when other citrus has finished. It has a slight tang to it but is well worth growing for summer fruit.