Hi to all, First time here in this forum and am hoping for some tips and advice regarding my olive trees. I live in the San Francisco Bay Area (east bay) California USA. I have 2 Arbequina Olive trees about 3 years old, about 6'-6" in height and planted on the ceramic pots. Last year I had a good harvest on one of the trees about 3 lbs of olives but this year they are not looking good. See my attached photos. The fruits look shriveled. I water the trees at least 4 times a week. I started to notice the shriveling about a month ago after I gave them fertilizer. I used the Miracle Gro (blue color granules). I read in the several websites that its caused by over watering the plants. But I'm skeptical since I've been doing this to my tree for the past 2 years with no issue whatsover. So I stopped watering the trees for a while (about more than a week) and still the fruits are shriveled. Fearing that the roots were rotting, I decided to pull one of the tree from the pot to inspect. I washed the roots clean with a garden hose to see the roots are brown or white. Most of the roots are whitish in color meaning roots are still healthy. While I pulled the tree from the pot there were some roots that were left in the pot. Probably tore off from the tree. I repotted the tree back using the same soil and watered it . After 2 days the repotted tree looks limp and the leaves feel soft as you would expect from a tree being re-potted or replanted. Its been 5 days since I re-potted and looks like the tree is still limp and the soil remained wet despite the hot weather we are having here. My question here is that did I make a big mistake of pulling the tree out of the pot, cleaned the roots with water and repotted it? Is my tree going to die....or dead at this point? For the other tree, what should I do? Why is my olives are still shriveled despite me watering it 2 days ago? Need help and advice. Thank you all. Achilles
Although olive trees need regular watering to produce good harvest, watering them 4 times a week sounds a bit too extreme. Deep watering once a week to once a month, when there is no rain during this period, sounds about right.
