The Tropical Fruit Forum

Mango heads of South Florida!
I need to visit the area sometime before the end of June to visit an elderly relative in Palm Beach. Is there any specific time that would be best for maximum mango enjoyment? I assume later in that window will give me more access to ripe fruit. Anything else to take into account - events, etc?

we just removed a huge ficus, and for the first time in years I have sunshine to plant some mangoes in. The yard looks terribly bare though, so I need the 15-gallon size for quick growth.

I am looking to get 15 gallons:
- 1 x Maha Chanok
- 2 x some combo of Zill varietals (coconut cream, lemon zest, peach cobbler, etc...)

I spoke with Excalibur, but they were not very interested in helping me figure out shipping (I am willing to pay, but might need minor help with scheduling a pickup.logistics). These will need to be delivered to Miami, for trans-shipment to Aruba, where I live.

Anybody have any leads?

Best from the southern Caribbean,

dave

In a previous discussion on Valencia Pride trees someone suggested top-working as a solution to the VP's runaway growth. I have been trying to figure out if this is what I should do, and I have some questions for you grafting badasses out there:

1) is this a good idea?

2) will top-working a slow growth variety I have like NDM onto the VP base calm the tree down completely?

3) Can this be done in phases? IE, can I do a quarter of the tree at a time so it's not too ugly? The VP is a beautiful tree and it sits in my driveway in front of my house, and I'd rather not have it reduced to a stump for aesthetic reasons, if possible.

4) does someone like me, with zero grafting experience, even stand a chance of making this work?

Thanks! I am fighting a losing battle trying to keep this tree subdued, and can use all the help I can get.

I'll be in St Pete for the next 5 days visiting family and I'd love to get a bunch of tropical fruit to eat (esp fresh ripe mangoes).
Anybody have any leads for me? Fruit stands? Nurseries that sell excess mangoes?
I've been fairly mango-free down here in Aruba, since my Valencia Pride is late, and there aren't many decent mangoes in the markets...

About a year and a half ago I imported a small garcinia intermedia from Florida, planting it in the shade under a big ficus tree in the back yard. In that time it has barely grown - only one leaf flush in 18 months... Pic:


A couple of days ago I noticed some strange round growths on the tree - and now there are 5 in total!

I have several mango trees that are fruiting for the first time right now, which confronts me with the question: how do I know when they're ripe for the picking? Is anyone aware of any resource out there with pictures or descriptions of different mango varieties with advice on when to pick? It might be a good column to add to the mango file Sheehan created on google docs...

My mouth is watering looking at these fruit hanging on my trees, and I'm worried that if I don't get some solid info I'm going to waste a bunch of mangoes by picking them too green!

I have had an inexplicably difficult time getting my mango trees to fruit. So I started the potassium nitrate spraying regimen (from another thread on this forum). Last week was the last of the 4 weeks of spraying, and guess what? Today I found the first blooms on my biggest two trees!

So excited!

The VP, so you can see how big it is. How is it possible this thing has never flowered before?



A representative flower. Weirdly, the whole bottom six feet or so has flowers, with nothing on higher branches (yet?)




Here's the only flower (so far!) on the Edward. I know this is pretty lame for you guys who are constantly inundated with fruit, but I've waited a LONG time for this! Woo hoo!

So my best friend wants to plant a new tree in his big back yard, and he wants a shade tree and doesn't care about fruit. (How we remain friends is a bit of a mystery...)

Anyway, I selfishly see this as an opportunity to install another tasty fruit tree in a friendly yard here in Aruba.

Parameters:

1) tree must grow quickly, turning into a large shade tree.

2) his yard is basically solid limestone (he lives right on the water), so the tree will be planted in a hole made gouged into the rock.

Anybody have any opinions on this one? I was thinking about a Valencia Pride mango, but am worried that the smallish area for rooting might hold the tree back...

So since I've run out of space to plant new mango trees I've decided to try multi-grafting some trees so I can continue to expand my offering. I've watched the Fairchild videos, and read some stuff online, but I'm still not 100% sure on a few things...

1) what supplies can I not live without? I ask because you can't get any of the usual stuff (parafilm, veneer knives, etc) in Aruba. For tape I've got some plumber's teflon tape, some of that green tape that nurseries use to stake plants, or regular types of tape. For knives the best I can do is probably a nice chopping knife with a well-sharpened blade.

2) is grafting branches at all different from the trunk grafting that is done in the youtube tutorials?

3) it's very windy here in Aruba. Is there anything I could do to protect the grafts? I was thinking about some kind of splint...

4) should the scion have actual small buds forming, or just have the initial swelling that comes before new leaves are pushed out?

Thanks in advance for the help! I'm going to try a couple today with the supplies I've got, just to see what happens. I've got a friend with a mongrel mango tree in his yard and I'm going to try grafting some Edward scion on it. Wish me luck!

-dave

My Dad, who lives in St Pete, just wrote me with the following question:

"why are my avocado trees dropping dozens of small fruit, from walnut size to baseball size?  There are still a bunch on the trees, but many are falling.  Is that a standard happening, or were the trees damaged due to cold or drought, and don't have the strength to finish the whole crop?"

I'm passing this one along to you guys, since I don't know much (anything) about avocados...

Any advice for my old man?

I recently decided to plant a couple banana trees in a tiny fringe by my driveway that unfortunately is too small for a mango tree. So I headed over to bananas.org (an absolutely incredible site, btw) for information, and found that there's just so much out there it's a bit mind-boggling for a banana beginner such as myself.

So here's my question, from one mango lover to a forum full of them: what is the Pickering of bananas? What is the banana that best embodies the wonderful traits of this super popular mango: dwarf, precocious, delicious fruit, etc, etc.?

My wife and our two dogs moved into our current house a little over 3 years ago, and I of course immediately started planting mangoes. Here's the mystery: despite the fact that everything is growing healthily, has been given potash, micronutrients, etc, I have still not gotten ONE SINGLE FRUIT! It's a true mango mystery...

Anyway, here's the quick virtual tour:

This is an Edward I planted from a 7-gallon from Pine Island about a year and a half ago. It's grown tall (it's pretty spindly actually) quickly, on the site of a dearly-departed royal poinciana.


Here's a Carrie I got almost 3 years ago. It has grown VERY slowly, but is also my only mango tree that has ever produced a flower: a single lone stalk which came out in the rainy season (Octoberish) and turned black and died despite copper spray.


This is a lancetilla that I got about a year and a half ago, after reading descriptions online of the huge fruit. It has done OK, but the leaves are always a little yellowish.


Here's a hard-to-see pic of my alphonso, which is beautiful and green, but also has never flowered. Love the huge emerald leaves on this thing!


This is my glenn, which is growing slowly since it only gets afternoon sun from about 2pm - sunset.


Seemingly just to taunt my lack of fruit, this is my neighbor's old mango tree, hanging almost totally into my yard and well-covered with flowers and tiny fruit. This thing bears once or twice a year, and produces very sweet, somewhat fibrous mangoes that are small and lack good mango flavor.


Here's the po pyu kalay in the front yard that is also replacing a big royal poinciana tree that died of old age/root rot.


Here's the PPK's neighbor, a nam doc mai I got from PI over two years ago. It was in a pot for about a year, and has only really been getting TLC since I stuck it in the ground around 6 months ago.


Last but not least, here's the valencia pride tree that has taken over the driveway area. It was the first mango I planted when we moved in, from a 25 gallon tree from PI. It seems like it's constantly growing new leaves, but it has never produced even a single flower.



Anybody have any feedback about pruning, tree health, etc, and especially why we haven't had any flowering/fruit?