hello,

A friend says they could get lemon budwood/sticks from their
mom living in costa rica. I (and friend) reside in NW Arkansas.
Anyone know of legality issues if we asked her to mail some
bud sticks for grafting onto my lemon rootstock?

_Will

Living citrus tissue cannot be brought into the US from any other country, except under the most extreme of permitting and quarantine licensing through USDA-APHIS.

I don't know about the legality, as you are in Arkansas, but if you are going to go to all the trouble of budding, then growing the tree out over the years, it would be wise to insure that any budwood used was virus free. Who knows what diseases, viroids, and viruses budwood from Costa Rica could contain. - Millet (1,096-)

There's a very bad citrus disease called citrus variegated chlorosis that is present in Costa Rica but not yet present in the U.S. You don't want to be responsible for bringing that disease here.

Thanks for all the [timely] responses...

my first inclination was that it probably was a bad idea,
but I thought I'd ask and learn something; and I have.

+Will