Mango: 2023 SoCal mango start flowering

[sapote]

Most of my trees start to send out flower stokes on Dec 1st 2022 -- much early than normal. Too bad as I will only let the fruitlets hold after March. I think reason is those trees didn't have flowers or fruits this year and they are busted with energy.

Same for your trees?

[Eggo]

My smaller trees are flushing with vegetative growth but I heavily fertilize last month hoping for leaves over flowers.  I don't know if it's the weather or not as it seem others been getting lots of vegetative growth also.

My larger trees, I did not fertilize. They don't appear to be doing anything at the moment.

[kh0110]

My franken Manila has started to bloom also for 3 weeks now and I've been spraying sulfur once a week since then. I'm determined to get some fruits this coming season. Powdery mildew has been wrecking havoc for the last 2 years.
The tree is 16 years old but no that tall.

[Oolie]

It may not solve all of the issues, but one method that has been suggested is continually removing panicles to stimulate rebloom only allowing the blooms that form after the final rain of the winter season to remain. The idea being that the stimulated reblooms should form sometime after the final propagating event for the PM. That said, it may not work if the tree is planted in an area that receives significant morning dew. Only the most inland valleys have a chance to really avoid the mist, or east facing slopes far inland. For the most part the sulfur sprays may be the answer, though I've read skim milk preparations work as well.

[sapote]

I don't know if the cold weather, or PM, that caused the fruits to have no developed seed and then they all cracked and fell off. This is the reason why I only let the trees hold fruits after March/April.

[kh0110]

My problem, at my location, is powdery mildew. No fruit or 2-3 from a lucky variety for the last 2 years. I'm trying to change this with sulfur spray.

[John B]

My in ground  sweet tart(on atulfo rootstock) started to flower. All others growing vegetatively. Quite interesting that it still had hanging fruit and started flowering. I will not let the first bloom flush fruit since it always gets PM  early on.

[sapote]

wow, more than 3 months since I reported of the flower panicles on the trees, and now here they are still with flower buds not open yet. The cold weather slow down the flower development, I think. So far no bad sign of PM yet. I hope the buds will fully open for the bees in March and it should be warmer by then. I also think we only have the best wind from March to early May, before the marine layer moving in causing morning dews in warm weather and it a good recipe for PM. Took this pic this morning on LZ + O-krung tong grafted on HD mexican rootstock:


 

[sapote]

My franken Manila has started to bloom also for 3 weeks now and I've been spraying sulfur once a week since then. I'm determined to get some fruits this coming season. Powdery mildew has been wrecking havoc for the last 2 years.
The tree is 16 years old but no that tall.

16 yrs old grafted tree planted when it's 2 ft tall? Young grafted tree takes forever to grow.

[Eggo]

I got about over 2 dozen varieties blooming right now but since most were grafts from last year I don't intend to let the fruit mature.

But my larger trees are blooming quite a bit. I have 3 mature trees blooming(nameless seedling). Hoping for a good year.

[Eggo]

My franken Manila has started to bloom also for 3 weeks now and I've been spraying sulfur once a week since then. I'm determined to get some fruits this coming season. Powdery mildew has been wrecking havoc for the last 2 years.
The tree is 16 years old but no that tall.

I like those big box store Manila as rootstocks. They grow vast and vigorous but they seem to be very powdery mildew prone and carriers for PD that seems to spread to everything else year round.  Luckily my large trees are now are mostly a variety that is very resistant to PD even though it's a nameless seedling.

[sapote]

The cold weather in soCal this year delay all of my mango flower buds from opening and they are blacken. The pic in my post #7 of Feb 18 with all the flower buds and none have opened. How is everyone's mango flower condition?

[John B]

The cold weather in soCal this year delay all of my mango flower buds from opening and they are blacken. The pic in my post #7 of Feb 18 with all the flower buds and none have opened. How is everyone's mango flower condition?

Yeah, same here. Anthracnose has kicked in on all my Mango's. I don't spray, so I'll just let them grow out of it and probably do a hard prune this year to strengthen the branches. My tree isn't nearly as large as yours though.

[Eggo]

The cold weather in soCal this year delay all of my mango flower buds from opening and they are blacken. The pic in my post #7 of Feb 18 with all the flower buds and none have opened. How is everyone's mango flower condition?

Same here, lots of blacken disease blooms. Some still look like it has a chance.  I have about 30 varieties grafted on 8 trees on one plot, everything began to flush and bloom a while ago except for 2 varieties, Maha Chanok and Bombay, they are just beginning to flush which I thought was strange but a good thing as it would miss our cooler weather and rain and maybe even the peak powdery mildew season.  My other Maha on another plot has just barely beginning to flush also.  Has your Maha bloom?

[sapote]

  Has your Maha bloom?

All mature trees sent out flower stems back in January, including Maha. However the younger seedlings (2.5" or larger trunk) just sent out now. I believe the trees that didn't have much fruits last year tend to send out flower earlier, and those that had more fruits last year are starting to have flower buds now.
Will see after this cold week if the weather not warm up fast, then I might pick off all of the old flowers to stimulate a new ones.

[sapote]

wow, more than 3 months since I reported of the flower panicles on the trees, and now here they are still with flower buds not open yet. The cold weather slow down the flower development, I think. So far no bad sign of PM yet. I hope the buds will fully open for the bees in March and it should be warmer by then. I also think we only have the best wind from March to early May, before the marine layer moving in causing morning dews in warm weather and it a good recipe for PM. Took this pic this morning on LZ + O-krung tong grafted on HD mexican rootstock:


 

This patch of flowers became black and fell off. Then a 2nd patch happened in late March/early April but had major PM, so I picked them off (a mistake I think). Then 3rd patch of flowers came in May then hit by SoCal June gloom. None of LZ have any fruits this year, but other varieties hold decent fruits.
I believe that I made the mistake of removing all flowers of the 2nd patch which might be ok to have some LZ fruits. Flowering in June in SoCal is not good.

How are your SoCal mango this season?

Btw, in the pic the top branches are LZ and the lower branches near the mosaic table are Okrung which hold decent fruits while the bigger and taller LZ have none this year

[Victoria Ave]

Valencia Pride holding a good amount of mangoes getting finger size. Last year only harvested 4 hoping to double it this year. Have a few panicles on it right now so maybe a late season hold.










Mallika tree second year in the ground, thinned fruits to only branches I didn’t want to grow any more for now, or where growth was occurring above fruit. It’s still tiny but healthy flushes and holding fruit so we’ll see




Sweet tart scions out on a few weeks ago are really pushing with this heat as well as my other seedling flushing great with the heat

[sapote]

Valencia Pride holding a good amount of mangoes getting finger size. Last year only harvested 4 hoping to double it this year. Have a few panicles on it right now so maybe a late season hold.

Are these trees grafted from FL? They look so lanky. Growing mangoes from seeds is a sure and fast way in SoCal.

[Victoria Ave]

Just the Valencia Pride and mallika. Others are seedlingns

[sapote]

This is a bad year of mango fruits for me: all the trees are doing great but not much fruits 
LZ: so much flowers but zero fruits.
ST Maui: normally a reliable fruiting variety, but all small fruits fell off.
Okrung: many fruitlets but cracked because there is no seed
Peach cobbler: normally very reliable and held about 30 fruits, this year it had only 10 and all fell off at about thumb size. It sent out summer flowers but no fruits. It seems the three is in growing reason and so it aborted the fruits, or it's too warm for flowers to develop to fruits.


Here are the trees with no fruits:
(FL people think we are crazy to have mango trees inches next to the house
LZ on the top high and Okrung on the left and lower -- both are grafts on one HD Lavern rootstock:


Peach cobbler on the right and left side: Okrung, maha, ST Maui on Glenn rootstock: