Author Topic: Growing Mango trees in Southern California  (Read 179928 times)

JF

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Re: Growing Mango trees in Southern California
« Reply #475 on: September 24, 2020, 04:43:12 PM »
Great job Brad, seedlings are looking fantastic !

Lovetoplant

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Re: Growing Mango trees in Southern California
« Reply #476 on: September 24, 2020, 06:33:46 PM »
you would  plant multiple seeds to pick the strongest seedling but not because fear of failed graft.....once you pick the strong one and let it grow..... top work it and  multiple new branches should emerge graft a  couple and you should have a couple branches to spare.   I got lucky all 3 took but even if it didnt you see I had back up. 




Your rootstock looks big and the trunk is quite thick.  How old you let it grow before you start grafting new scions onto it?  Thanks

Future

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Re: Growing Mango trees in Southern California
« Reply #477 on: September 24, 2020, 07:03:54 PM »
Heres some pics of Simons mango block that we planted at my house.  Theres around 50 mango trees on 15'x15' spacing. About 40 are various seedlings ungrafted.  A few florida grafted trees are doing well, the seedling trees grow faster though.  Ive done very little for these trees, they are on a sprinkler timer and get fertilized avocado fertilizer 3 times each hot season.  And trim them back to ~16" shoots and tipping below the tightly spaces top nodes.  Then thin back the new shoots to 3 new branches per cut.  This keeps them perky so they dont get top heavy and droopy.  If theres any weak trees or infected trees, they get yanked and replaced.  Ive probably yanked 20% of the trees and replanted.





Orange sherbet seedling 2016 or 2017 sprout


Sweet tart seedling 2016 sprout.  This one made a couple flower panicles in winter 2019/20


Taralay on turpintine from FL.


Taralay and sweet tart half and half grafted tree on manilla rootstock.


COC seed 2018 sprouted


J12 seed 2017 sprout


Absolutely incredible.

SHV

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Re: Growing Mango trees in Southern California
« Reply #478 on: September 24, 2020, 11:08:27 PM »
Brad, you may have answered this before but do you provide any cold protection for your seedlings during the winter?  I live in a similar climate to you and have planted out a large number of mango seedlings in ground.   Lost a few to the chill last year, but they were mostly the weaklings.  Trying to determine if there is anything else I can do this winter in case of a rare cold front so that I can protect my 1-2 year old seedling plants.

spaugh

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Re: Growing Mango trees in Southern California
« Reply #479 on: September 24, 2020, 11:34:24 PM »
No, it doesnt get cold enough to kill them here.  The long cold season makes them get a little beat up but not enough to die unless they get an infection. 

I dont use any protection or sprays or anything, just let the weak ones die and keep the strong ones.  Nursing along weak trees in a marginal climate won't really get better with age.

The thing here is the hill is so high all the cold air drains down, theres solid frost 500ft away at the neighbors house at the bottom of the hill.   
Brad Spaugh

simon_grow

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Re: Growing Mango trees in Southern California
« Reply #480 on: September 24, 2020, 11:59:21 PM »
Thanks for posting the pictures Brad! Sometimes you will get some seedlings or grafted trees that just won’t grow and it’s just not worth the time when it’s so easy to just plant another tree there that will hopefully grow better. The soil on Brads property is incredible with excellent drainage and he gets significantly more heat units than I get at my house.

Now that some of these trees have established their root systems, they should just take off. I can’t wait for some of these to start producing!

Simon

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Re: Growing Mango trees in Southern California
« Reply #481 on: September 25, 2020, 11:03:24 AM »
Your trees are looking great, Brad!

SHV

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Re: Growing Mango trees in Southern California
« Reply #482 on: September 25, 2020, 01:00:47 PM »
Thanks for the response guys.  Makes sense not to waste time on the weak sprouts.  This is turning out to be a long growing season.  The upcoming heat wave should push another round of growth for the trees.  Water will be key with expected winds and low humidity!  Several of my trees have some crispy leaves after the last heat wave that pushed temps above 110 in my area.

UplanderCA

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Re: Growing Mango trees in Southern California
« Reply #483 on: September 25, 2020, 01:52:02 PM »
Heres some pics of Simons mango block that we planted at my house.  Theres around 50 mango trees on 15'x15' spacing. About 40 are various seedlings ungrafted.  A few florida grafted trees are doing well, the seedling trees grow faster though.  Ive done very little for these trees, they are on a sprinkler timer and get fertilized avocado fertilizer 3 times each hot season.  And trim them back to ~16" shoots and tipping below the tightly spaces top nodes.  Then thin back the new shoots to 3 new branches per cut.  This keeps them perky so they dont get top heavy and droopy.  If theres any weak trees or infected trees, they get yanked and replaced.  Ive probably yanked 20% of the trees and replanted.





Orange sherbet seedling 2016 or 2017 sprout


Sweet tart seedling 2016 sprout.  This one made a couple flower panicles in winter 2019/20


Taralay on turpintine from FL.


Taralay and sweet tart half and half grafted tree on manilla rootstock.


COC seed 2018 sprouted


J12 seed 2017 sprout


Brad,
Thank-you for sharing.  "Pictures are worth a thousand words"  The Turpentine rootstock is doing quite well.  I imagine that you may have some "critter issues" (rabbits, gophers, squirrels, chipmunks, rats).  Do you do anything to control them?

Tony   

spaugh

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Re: Growing Mango trees in Southern California
« Reply #484 on: September 25, 2020, 03:42:08 PM »
Theres a deer fence around the orchard that keeps rabbit and deer out. 

For gophers, I trap them whenever I see a mound and have them under control.  Theres 0 in the orchard at the moment.  Same for squirrels, leave a trap out and put some fruit in it and they get trapped and shot. 

Rats and mice are abundant but they don't do too much damage.  They too can be trapped with snap traps but they just keep coming.  Everything is being kept under control with minimal efforts.  Theres a healthy ecosystem with many species of snakes, coyotes, and birds of prey here also.  And we free range chickens and ducks that eat bugs.
« Last Edit: September 25, 2020, 03:44:53 PM by spaugh »
Brad Spaugh

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Re: Growing Mango trees in Southern California
« Reply #485 on: September 25, 2020, 05:25:50 PM »
Getting intrigued with mangos for Southern California.  Here is a video of mango trees in Phoenix, AZ for insperation.  Some are 40 ft tall/25 years old:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t57YGE1oMbg&ab_channel=ShamusO%27Leary

simon_grow

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Re: Growing Mango trees in Southern California
« Reply #486 on: September 26, 2020, 03:15:53 AM »
Getting intrigued with mangos for Southern California.  Here is a video of mango trees in Phoenix, AZ for insperation.  Some are 40 ft tall/25 years old:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t57YGE1oMbg&ab_channel=ShamusO%27Leary

I saw that video a while back and those huge mango trees are amazing. We have a bunch of huge trees like that in SoCal also and I’ve posted the pictures of Leos huge seedling trees that have been top worked.

Simon

Johnny Eat Fruit

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Re: Growing Mango trees in Southern California
« Reply #487 on: September 26, 2020, 09:55:38 PM »
Really cool Simon. Good to see photos of your seedling mango trees planted more inland with more heat hours. You and I are more in the coastal zone so our growth will be somewhat less overall. I have many of the same varieties you plant but I grafted mine to Ataulfo or Mexican manila seedling. So far they are doing well with excellent 2020 growth so far. Will post some photos of my trees in October after they finish their current growth flushes.

Enclosed are some photos for a mango seedling tree in Alhambra (just south of Pasadena) that is quite large. It is the largest seedling tree I have seen hear in California but I don't know what type it is.

Thanks for your input and advice over the years. It got me started in mango grafting and propagation in 2016.

Johnny







Lovetoplant

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Re: Growing Mango trees in Southern California
« Reply #488 on: September 27, 2020, 05:26:05 PM »
You can read through the old threads like this one here:
http://tropicalfruitforum.com/index.php?topic=31734.msg349437#msg349437
There wasn’t a lot of info last years but the years prior to 2019 has lots of good info regarding members favorite varieties for each given year.

This thread is a bit more relevant with a bit of info regarding the best tasting and reliable Mangos for SoCal.
http://tropicalfruitforum.com/index.php?
topic=31480.msg347770#msg347770


Some of the best tasting varieties like Lemon Zest, hardly produce here( without spraying) because of disease issues.

Sweet Tart,Venus, CAC, Edward, Peach Cobbler, NDM, Gary, Carrie and several other varieties have proven to be productive over several years of observations and at various locations around SoCal. Other varieties that are promising but lacking data are Cotton Candy, E4, Juicy Peach.

Leo Manuel also has multiple good to excellent tasting varieties that are productive in areas with high fungal disease pressures.

Simon
Any particular mango varieties growing well in Oxnard, Ventura county area?

Lovetoplant

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Re: Growing Mango trees in Southern California
« Reply #489 on: September 27, 2020, 05:37:22 PM »
Here are some updates to some seedling mangos that Brad and I planted at the orchard. We initially planted a bunch of Florida trees because they were already purchased before Brad and I partnered up but most eventually died and the few remaining trees are either stunted or so droopy and diseased that were probably going to just pull them all out if Brad hasn’t already done so.

These are some seedling trees, some from Polyembryonic seeds, some from Monoembryonic seeds. The seedling trees tend to have a nice, upright structure that is not droopy. Most these trees are only a year or two old, I think the biggest one is 2-3 years old.







Simon

Simon, any of mango in the  photos has multiple rootstocks?   Also what variety of the mango growing from seed in the first photo?  It has very pretty nice foliage without any signs of fungal disease or anthranose.

simon_grow

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Re: Growing Mango trees in Southern California
« Reply #490 on: September 27, 2020, 06:39:39 PM »
All of the varieties I listed should produce in Ventura as long as you’re not in a cold or wet pocket. I don’t recall what that first seedling is.

We planted a nice California Super Mango Rootstock tree with about five rootstocks on it and it grew like crazy but unfortunately the gophers had a liking to it. That was a few years ago and the gophers are gone now but so is the super rootstock. I believe we still have one or two double rootstock tree that was not grafted with mature scions.

In California, innarching two seedlings together is fine as long as you don’t graft mature scions onto it.

Simon

Lovetoplant

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Re: Growing Mango trees in Southern California
« Reply #491 on: September 27, 2020, 07:13:26 PM »
Has anyone ever experiment trying to rid all matured leaves from the first year growth of the seedlings in order to promote a faster growth rate?  I suspect that if all matured leaves are all gone, the roots will send all of the nutrients/energy to purge on the new growth. 
  Cham

simon_grow

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Re: Growing Mango trees in Southern California
« Reply #492 on: September 27, 2020, 07:23:20 PM »
Hey Cham, I have not tried that but it would be interesting to see what happens. I would guess that without leaves, there would be little stored energy for much root or shoot growth after one push of leaves. It may also leave the tree in a weakened state. If you try it, please post your results. Did you read this on a research article?

You can also get taller plants by light deprivation but the growth will be lanky and weak. It’s called etoliation.

Simon

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Re: Growing Mango trees in Southern California
« Reply #493 on: September 27, 2020, 08:01:22 PM »
No.  The first set of matured leaves on one of my seedlings had some damages.  So I cut all but left 2 heathy leaves on it.  A few days later, new shoot started to emerge and hardened.  It seems to grow faster than the others seedlings.

Growing mango is new to me, but I will get this trial going and report the result.

Cham

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Re: Growing Mango trees in Southern California
« Reply #494 on: October 09, 2020, 11:33:15 PM »
Brad, you may have answered this before but do you provide any cold protection for your seedlings during the winter?  I live in a similar climate to you and have planted out a large number of mango seedlings in ground.   Lost a few to the chill last year, but they were mostly the weaklings.  Trying to determine if there is anything else I can do this winter in case of a rare cold front so that I can protect my 1-2 year old seedling plants.

OK I'm not Brad, but I have solved this problem after a bad frost a couple years back damaged some of my young avocado trees. When I was traveling for work, I returned home to find major frost damage on the young avocados so I set out to find a solution which would work even if I am not home.

I already had a personal weather station (PWS) which gave me the temperature right in my grove, literally in the middle of the avocado section.  I bought an outdoor  "smart outlet", and set up an IFTTT account - IFTTT is a website (If This Then That) that lets users easily create an "applet" that automates one action based on one other input.  In my case I set up an applet that turns on the smart outlet when the PWS temp drops below 35F.   I connected the smart outlet to a string of old incandescent christmas lights and wrapped them around the young avocados.   The strings are 175 watts each, but you can daisy chain them of course to get more heat.   So now in my grove, when the temp in the avocado section drops below 35, the lights come on and produce heat for the young trees.   IFTTT turns them off when the temp rises above 35 again.     IFTTT is free for simple users like this and only a few $ per month for very complex users, creating this one applet would be free.

A PWS is about $175-200.  A smart outlet is $20-30 on Amazon.  Lights and extension cords are maybe $50-100 depending on what you have lying around.  A PWS is not actually required but without your own you are depending on a weather station nearby which may be unreliable or may not match your micro climate in your yard.  You can use Weather underground's closest station to trigger IFTTT but I wanted control so I use my own PWS. 

I use the PWS and IFTTT to also automate my sprinkler timer (Rachio) so that if the temp rises above 105, the Avocado's get an extra watering session.  Kept them all cool and happy through the multiple 115+ degree days we had in Sept.

Hope this helps anyone who is looking for a solution to keep Mango's thriving when it gets cold out.  If you have questions feel free to ping me and I will help you out, this sort of automation is super easy but its also my day job, so if you have questions, just ask.   I've read this whole thread and I really appreciate the info here... I'll be doing a little more research then stopping by again for some feedback/questions.   Til then, happy growing.

/Dave

slopat

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Re: Growing Mango trees in Southern California
« Reply #495 on: October 10, 2020, 01:28:54 PM »
Home automation and using web services is awesome.

The HC11,8031/51, rs422 linking systems (remote telemetry) are ancient compared to Pi and wifi, plus internet! Python rocks over basic and C :)

But for cheapskates like me. There are other available plug and play solutions.

Inkbird ITC-308 Digital Temperature Controller 2-Stage Outlet Thermostat Heating and Cooling Mode

Or even cheaper. (Amazon or HomeDepot)
120 VAC/15A Thermo Cube Thermostatically Controlled Double Outlet

I think someone here or another forum have posted about them before. The big risks besides no power is no internet/web services. With this WFH, its been a super pain when offline be it MS auth breaking last week, webex overloads, or backhoes digging up fiber.

SHV

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Re: Growing Mango trees in Southern California
« Reply #496 on: October 10, 2020, 06:19:30 PM »
Great post Dave and nice setup. I hadn’t considered setting up a personal weather station...until now. I’m the kind of data nerd that would get a kick out of microclimate weather data on my farm. Not sure I’m willing go as far as automating a climate control system to the data, even if we are only talking about X-mas lights, as my mango seedlings are too numerous and planting area too extensive. I am in the process of automating some water stations. This sounds ideal for tracking heat waves with responsive irrigation.  I like it!

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Re: Growing Mango trees in Southern California
« Reply #497 on: October 30, 2020, 03:05:29 PM »
I would like try growing a mango tree in Long Beach, and after reading through this thread it looks like mango seedlings are the best way to go. Is there somewhere I can go around Los Angeles/OC to buy different varieties of the fruits (for seeds) or do I need to order seeds online? I know there are tons of mango varieties available at stands in Florida, but I've never seen any varieties other than Alfonso or the regular Mexican mangoes here. Is it easier to just plant a manila and then learn how to graft?

RodneyS

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Re: Growing Mango trees in Southern California
« Reply #498 on: October 30, 2020, 03:17:01 PM »
I would like try growing a mango tree in Long Beach, and after reading through this thread it looks like mango seedlings are the best way to go. Is there somewhere I can go around Los Angeles/OC to buy different varieties of the fruits (for seeds) or do I need to order seeds online? I know there are tons of mango varieties available at stands in Florida, but I've never seen any varieties other than Alfonso or the regular Mexican mangoes here. Is it easier to just plant a manila and then learn how to graft?

Buy Ataulfo/Manila, Kent & Keitt mangoes from the supermarket, then plant the seeds.  Watch videos on cleft grafting, and buy grafting tape ( Parafilm, Buddy tape) and a grafting knife or a razor blade.  Source mango scionwood from other members.  You can also purchase scion at tropicalacresfarms.com in the summer.

palingkecil

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Re: Growing Mango trees in Southern California
« Reply #499 on: October 30, 2020, 07:22:21 PM »
I would like try growing a mango tree in Long Beach, and after reading through this thread it looks like mango seedlings are the best way to go. Is there somewhere I can go around Los Angeles/OC to buy different varieties of the fruits (for seeds) or do I need to order seeds online? I know there are tons of mango varieties available at stands in Florida, but I've never seen any varieties other than Alfonso or the regular Mexican mangoes here. Is it easier to just plant a manila and then learn how to graft?

Join the Mango Growers of America and California Mango Growers community in facebook. Many members are kind enough to give away seeds for free or just a little shipping fee.
Some mango varieties grow well in California on turpentine rootstock. I have a Sweet Tart on turpentine that grows like weed. My friend grows healthy Malika and Glenn on turpentine for 15 years.
If you can graft is a great benefit, I failed so many times that I wasted a lot of money. Finally I decided to just buy varieties of grafted trees on turpentine that grows well here from Florida.
Good luck!
« Last Edit: October 30, 2020, 07:33:45 PM by palingkecil »