Does the emergence of flowers before Tu Bishevat determine ma'aser year?
Question
I see on my mandarin tree that some of the flowers set right before 15 Shevat. Assuming that citrus fruits also follow chanatah, how would I deal with terumot and ma'aserot? Would I need to take from each fruit separately?
Answer
Chanatah is fruit set, not flower set – i.e. the beginning of the development of fruit (when the fruit is roughly the size of an olive).
There would only be an issue of fruits belonging to different ma'aser years on the same tree if you had some fruits that reached this stage before Tu Bishevat, and some after. Flower set isn't relevant. This issue can be present with lemon, almond, and loquat trees that can reach fruit set around Tu Bishevat time – but that doesn't seem to be the case here.