Tangerine

The mandarin or tangerine is cultivated for superior quality and delcious fruit. Cultivated mainly in the Punjab. Commonly grown varieties are:

(a) Early Feutrall. Fruit oblate; rind orange-red, smooth and glossy. Pulp sweet and juicy. Introduced from Australia. Ripens in November.

(b) Kinnow. Fruit deep yellow, apex round and flatened. Rind orange, smooth and glossy. Pulp very juicy, sweet-acidic and rich in flavour. Ripens in December-February. Introduced from N. America.

Tangerine or mandarin orange is the parent with Citrus maxima of C. ×aurantium, with C. japonica of C. ×microcarpa, and possibly with C. cavaleriei of C. ×junos. The recently recognized subspecies are perhaps better considered as cultivar groups to which most of the synonyms would be referred. However, some names in the synonymy may be referable to those cultivars of C. ×aurantium that are repeated backcrosses with C. reticulata. Trees referred to C. tachibana may represent true wild forms and have the following characteristics:

Trees to 3 m tall. Branchlets numerous, with short spines. Petiole 8-10 mm, very narrowly winged; leaf blade elliptic, 6-7 × 3.5-4 cm, secondary veins inconspicuous, base broadly cuneate, margin crenulate, apex narrow, obtuse, and conspicuously emarginate. Flowers solitary, 1.2-1.4 cm in diam.; flower buds subglobose. Pedicel ca. 2 mm. Petals white. Stamens ca. 20. Fruit yellow, oblate, 2-2.5 × 2.5-3.4 cm, smooth; pericarp 1.5-2 mm thick; sarcocarp with 7-9 segments, yellow, very acidic and bitter, 5- or 6-seeded. Seeds broadly ovoid, ca. 1 cm; seed coat smooth; embryos numerous; cotyledons greenish.

Slender tree, 4-6 m tall. Spines absent or short. Leaves 6-8 cm, lanceolate to ovate-lanceolate, serrate; petiole narrowly winged. Flowers white, axillary, mostly bisexual. Stamens more or less united into a tube. Fruit oblate or pyriform, 5-8 cm in diameter. Rind bright yellow to orange, tinged red, with sunken oil glands, usually rough and warty; rind easily separable from the pulp vesicles. Axis hollow. Pulp vesicles loosely attached. Pulp orange, sweet or acidic.

Small trees. Branchlets numerous, with few spines. Leaves 1-foliolate; leaf blade lanceolate, elliptic, or broadly ovate, basal articulated part to leaf blade usually narrow or only a remnant, midvein furcate near apex, margin apically obtusely crenulate or rarely entire, apex emarginate. Flowers solitary to 3 in a fascicle. Calyx irregularly 3-5-lobed. Petals usually 1.5 cm or less. Sta-mens 20-25. Style long, slender; stigma clavate. Fruit pale yellow, orange, red, or carmine, oblate to subglobose, smooth or coarse; pericarp very thin to thick, easily removed; sarcocarp with 7-14 segments or rarely more, sweet to acidic and sometimes bitter, with few to many seeds or rarely seedless; pulp vesicles plump, short, rarely slender and long. Seeds usually ovoid, base rounded, apex narrow and acute; embryos numerous, rarely solitary; cotyledons dark green, pale green, or milky white; chalaza purple. Fl. Apr-May, fr. Oct-Dec. 2n = 18, 27, 36.

Extensively cultivated in China S of the Qin Ling [possibly native to SE China and/or S Japan (see below)].

Hillside forests; low elevations. Taiwan [Japan (Ryukyu Islands)].

Citrus ×aurantium Linnaeus f. deliciosa (Tenore) Hiroe; C. ×aurantium var. tachibana Makino; C. daoxianensis S. W. He & G. F. Liu; C. deliciosa Tenore; C. depressa Hayata; C. erythrosa Yu. Tanaka; C. madurensis Loureiro var. deliciosa (Tenore) Sagot; C. mangshanensis S. W. He & G. F. Liu; C. ×nobilis Loureiro subf. deliciosa (Tenore) Hiroe; C. ×nobilis var. deliciosa (Tenore) Guillaumin; C. ×nobilis subf. erythrosa (Yu. Tanaka) Hiroe; C. ×nobilis var. major Ker Gawler; C. ×nobilis var. ponki Hayata; C. ×nobilis subf. reticulata (Blanco) Hiroe; C. ×nobilis var. spontanea Ito; C. ×nobilis subf. succosa (Tanaka) Hiroe; C. ×nobilis var. sunki Hayata; C. ×nobilis subf. tachibana (Makino) Hiroe; C. ×nobilis var. tachibana (Makino) Ito; C. ×nobilis subf. unshiu (Marcowicz) Hiroe; C. ×nobilis var. unshiu (Marcowicz) Tanaka ex Swingle; C. ×nobilis var. vangasy (Bojer) Guillaumin; C. ponki Yu. Tanaka; C. poonensis Yu. Tanaka; C. reticulata var. austera Swingle; C. reticulata subsp. deliciosa (Tenore) Rivera et al.; C. reticulata subsp. tachibana (Tanaka) Rivera et al.; C. reticulata subsp. unshiu (Marcowicz) Rivera et al.; C. succosa Tanaka; C. suhuiensis Hayata; C. sunki Tanaka; C. tachibana (Makino) Yu. Tanaka; C. tachibana subf. depressa (Hayata) Hiroe; C. tachibana subf. ponki (Hayata) Hiroe; C. tachibana subf. suhuiensis (Hayata) Hiroe; C. tachibana subf. sunki (Hayata) Hiroe; C. tangerina Yu. Tanaka; C. tankan Hayata; C. unshiu Marcowicz; C. vangasy Bojer.

Citrus nobilis, the tangerine, mandarin or mandarin orange (including the ‘Clementine’ or clementine mandarin), or satsuma, is a cold-intolerant small fruit tree in the Rutaceae (citrus family) that originated in southwestern China or northeastern India. Referred to in many classifications as C. reticulata, it is now grown in tropical and semi-tropical areas around the world for its sweet, juicy, and easy-to-peel fruits. The tangerine tree is among the most drought- and frost-tolerant of citrus trees, although developing fruits can be severely damaged by cold. Common names among this type of citrus fruit can be confusing, as numerous cultivars and hybrids have been developed, and similar common names may be applied to those as well as to related species (including the Mediterranean mandarin, C. deliciosa, the king mandarin—previously the common name for C. nobilis--and the satsuma mandarin, C. unshiu, among others). Hybrids include the tangor and tangelo (C. reticulata X C. sinensis), of which the minneola is a popular variety; and the large Jamaican “Ugli” or ugli fruit (a cross between a tangerine and a grapefruit, C. reticulata X C. paradisi--which is itself a hybrid between the pomelo, C. maxima, and the sweet orange, C. sinensis). Tangerine trees are small—generally smaller than sweet orange trees, although some cultivars may reach a maximum height of 7.5 m (25 ft)-- with slender, spiny twigs. Leaves are lanceolate (lance-shaped), up to 3 cm (1.25 in) long, with narrow wings on the petioles (leaf stems). The white aromatic flowers, which grow singly or in clusters of 2 or 3, develop into small oblate (flattened spherical) fruits roughly 7.5 cm (3 in) in diameter that ripen to light or deep orange. The sweet, juicy pulp is divided into 10 to 14 segments that separate easily from each other and from the thin skin or peel. Tangerines and mandarins, which are high in vitamins A and C as well as calcium and potassium, are generally eaten as a fresh fruit, but may also be processed into juice and used in beverages and cocktails. The fruit is sometimes used for jams or marmalades, and in cooking. The peel (or whole fruit) may be used to flavor liquers and candies. Total commercial production of tangerines of various varieties (including mandarins and clementines) was 21.3 million metric tons (mt), harvested from 2.0 million hectares. China alone produced nearly half the global total (10.1 million mt), although the crop is considered quite important in Spain (the second leading producer, with 1.7 million mt). Other leading producers include Brazil and Turkey. Tangerines are the second most widely cultivated citrus fruit (after sweet oranges, C. sinensis). (Bailey et al. 1976, FAOSTAT 2012, Flora of China 2012, Morton 1987, van Wyk 2005.)

The tachibana orange (Citrus tachibana, or Citrus reticulata tachibana) is a variety of mandarin orange, a citrus fruit. They grow wild in the forests of Japan and are referred to in the poetry of the early Japanese and Ryukyu Islands kingdoms. The Tanaka System assigns them their own species, while the Swingle System places them in the same species with other mandarin oranges.

Genomic analysis has shown tachibana oranges to be a constellation of distinct natural F1 hybrids that cross the pure Ryukyu Island mandarin C. ryukyuensis with mainland Asian C. reticulata that was itself a hybrid of northern and southern subspecies, but also contained some prior Ryukyu mandarin introgression. They lack the pomelo introgression found in the closely-related domesticated mandarin oranges of mainland Asia, though they have a mainland-mandarin-derived transposable element insertion that causes them to reproduce asexually by apomixis, unlike their sexually-reproducing Ryukyu mandarin parent. This distinctive island parent is estimated to have diverged from mainland Asian mandarins, probably arising before 2 million years ago near where its mandarin cousins would later be domesticated in the Nanling Mountains of China, and likely spread to the islands over land bridges formed during Pleistocene glacial maxima, Rising sea levels provided the isolation that led to speciation, then either a subsequent fall in sea level or oceanic dispersal by rafting reestablished contact to allow for natural hybridization between the island and mainland mandarins between 40,000 and 200,000 years ago, giving rise to the tachibana oranges.