Lemon Myrtle
Backhousia citriodora
A tree-sized herb whose leaves are the crop, and they are at their strongest just before it comes into flower.
- Type
- Herb · Perennial
- Botanical family
- Mixed / other
- Foliage color
- Green
- Flower color
- White
- Sunlight
- Full sun, in a warm and sheltered spot.
- Watering
- Water regularly through summer, and ease off in winter.
- Feeding
- Feed through spring and summer; container plants want a monthly liquid feed.
- Frost tolerant
- Yes
- Flowering
- June
- Pruning
- Tip-prune it often, and shape it once flowering is over.
- Overwintering
- It needs frost-free shelter once temperatures drop below 5°C.
- Mar–Apr Bud Break
- Apr–Jun Harvest
- Jun–Nov Flowering
- Nov–Dec Dormancy
- Jan–Mar Dormancy
- Plant spacing
- 9 ft 10 in
- In-row spacing
- 9 ft 10 in
- Between rows
- 12 ft 4 in
- Square-foot density
- Not suited to SFG
- Root system
- Woody and fibrous
- Working depth
- 12–24 in
- Can reach
- 3 ft down where the soil allows
- Spread
- 15–20 ft across, about 1.5–2× the width of the plant
- Shallowest pot
- 20 in of soil
A shallow woody framework with the fine feeding roots in the leaf litter above it. Those feeders are mostly under the outer half of the canopy rather than against the stem, which is where water and feed should go.
The habit is Lemon Myrtle’s own; the figures are what that habit usually comes to at this size, not a measurement of this species. Roots follow the soil either way: a compacted pan, a high water table or heavy clay stops them well short of any of it, and deep open ground lets them go further.
Beneficial predators that hunt this plant's pests — grow their favourite flowers nearby to recruit them. companion plant
- Ladybird (lady beetle) Coccinellidae
The gardener’s favorite ally: adults and their alligator-shaped larvae each eat thousands of aphids, plus scale, mealybugs, and other soft-bodied sap-suckers. Grow flat, open flowers for the adults and never spray a colony that ladybird larvae are already working.
- Hoverfly SyrphidaeHunts Scale insects
Bee-mimicking flies whose legless larvae graze aphid colonies clean while the adults pollinate. A ribbon of shallow, nectar-rich flowers kept in bloom all season recruits wave after wave of them.
Lemongrass, Ginger, Turmeric
Herbs, like this one.
The Cottage Garden Companion — the gardener's herbarium at cottagegardencompanion.com