Is Thinning Citrus Fruit Really Necessary? (And When It’s Actually Important)

There’s nothing more exciting for a home citrus grower than seeing your tree covered in tiny citrus fruits. After your home grown lemon or lime has had a big flush of flowers and the fruit starts to form, should you start thinning citrus fruit clusters? Learn about when you might want to intervene and when you should trust your trees to sort themselves out.

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What is citrus fruit thinning and why do people do it?

Citrus thinning means removing excess young citrus fruit from a tree before they mature. It’s usually done when the the new fruit is about the size of a marble.

There are a few reasons why people thin citrus. It can potentially:

• help young trees grow stronger;
• reduce the strain on a tree and prevent branches from breaking off if the crop is too heavy;
• help make sure any remaining fruit grows as large as possible;  
• help even out crops, so the citrus tree doesn’t have a large crop one year and a small one the next (called alternate or biennial bearing).

Essentially, removing some of the young citrus fruit is thought to help the tree use its energy to grow fewer, larger and better fruit.

The good news: many citrus trees thin themselves

You’ve probably noticed that your citrus trees will drop young fruit by themselves, This usually happens after the citrus tree has finished flowering, often in late spring or early summer (depending on the variety and when it produces fruit). This process of losing a lot of young fruit is completely normal and not a sign something is wrong. It’s actually just your citrus tree doing it’s own natural citrus thinning.

My lemons and Tahitian limes tend to drop more than my oranges, mandarins and cumquats (kumquats).

Do you ever need to thin citrus by hand?

You may hear people say that thinning citrus is essential for a healthy tree and a good crop. This is usually true for commercial growers: citrus thinning is common practice in commercial citrus orchards. But in my experience, this isn’t always the case for home citrus growers. To be honest, I mostly don’t thin my citrus, except in some limited cases.

Manually thinning citrus fruit can makes sense when you have:

• Large clusters of fruit forming — when multiple fruits are growing in a tight bunch and competing directly with each other, thinning can help preserve some of the fruits and ensure they grow larger.
• Young or newly planted trees — a heavy crop on a young tree can exhaust it and set it back in the growth phase.
• Potted citrus — trees in containers have more limited resources, so if your potted citrus has a very heavy crop it may need some help.

Citrus varities prone to clusters and what I do

I grow many different types of citrus trees, some in the ground but most in containers. Even with my potted citrus trees, there are very limited times I need to thin the newly forming fruit.

I have a very old and heavy fruiting potted Tahitian lime that can grow up to 7 or more limes in a tight cluster. If I leave it alone, my lime will generally sort itself out by self-thinning. A few of the baby limes will drop off, leaving at most 3 to grow together. This older, established tree seems to cope well a few limes in a bunch. I get enormous crops of limes year after year from this small tree without any manual thinning at all.

My newer Lemonicious dwarf Myer lemon also has a tendancy to form very large clusters of flowers and then set lots of fruit close together. However, this potted lemon is a much younger tree than my lime. It’s important for it to put some energy into growing a stronger branch structure and not put all its energy into making fruit while it gets established.

Sometimes my lemon trees need a little help to reduce the fruit to a more manageable number. Once it finishes flowering and the small lemons start to grow, I will pick off a few of the smaller or damaged ones if they don’t seem to be falling off by themselves first.

How to thin citrus fruit if you decide to

If you notice that your tree has large clusters of young citrus fruits, or are concerned about whether your younger tree can handle a large crop, it’s easy to manually thin them. As a guide:

• Thin citrus while fruit is still small and green, about the size of a marble;
• Try to remove the smaller/weaker or any damaged fruits from a cluster, leaving the largest and stongest to continue growing.
• To remove fruit, pinch off by hand or snip with clean scissors.

There’s no need to work to a particular formula. Just break up the clusters of fruit to a more manageable number for your tree, taking into account it’s age, size and whether it’s in a pot or in the ground.

Overall, remember that it’s usually ok to let your tree do its own thing and manage it’s own crop. Just check for large clusters of fruit after the flowers drop, watch if your citrus drops some on its own, and only step in to thin if you really think it’s needed.

More about growing citrus at home

For more about growing your own citrus trees at home, read our tips for growing a Tahitian lime tree in a pot or how often to water a potted lemon. Or learn about different citrus pests and how to control them, like citrus gall wasp and citrus aphids.

If you’ve got a great crop of citrus fruits, discover what to do with lots of limes or check out some of our delicious citrus recipes using everything from lemons and oranges to yuzu and pomelo.

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