How to grow mango

Pick a well-drained spot that never floods and is not a frost pocket — a young mango is killed at about −2 °C, and cold air pools in low hollows. Avoid the bottoms of valleys and dips.

Mark the pits out nine full strides apart each way (about 9 m) — a mango becomes a big tree, and crowding gives you shade, disease and little fruit. That spacing gives about 135 trees per hectare. Decide it now, because you can never move a planted tree.

Dig each pit big — about one long stride across each way (roughly 1 m) and knee-to-hip deep — which takes out about 0.5–1 m³ of soil. Keep the dark topsoil in one pile and the poorer subsoil in another.

Mix the topsoil back with one to three full 20-litre tins of well-rotted manure (about 10–50 kg per pit) — dark, crumbly, no strong smell — and refill the pit with this good mix. Water it and let it settle.

Do this well ahead of planting — from about two months down to a week before — so the manure finishes rotting and the loose soil settles into a firm, ready bed.

Plant at the start of the rains, into the pit you already dug, filled and let settle. Water the pit the day before so the soil is moist right through, not just wet on top.

Set the tree at the same depth it grew in the nursery — no deeper. Keep the graft union (the knuckle-like bulge low on the stem where the good variety was joined to the rootstock) a hand-span (about 20 cm) above the soil, never buried.

Firm the soil gently around the roots and build a water basin — a low ring of soil about a stride (1 m) across — to hold water over the root zone.

Stake the young tree to a strong pole so wind can't rock it and tear the new roots. Tie it loosely in a figure-of-eight so the tie doesn't cut into the bark.

Water it in well, then 2–3 times a week while it settles. Lay a mulch ring of dry grass or leaves a stride out from the trunk, but keep the mulch a hand-span clear of the stem so the bark doesn't stay wet and rot.

For the first three years, check the young tree every 5–6 months. First, grow a single clear trunk to about hip height (0.75–1 m) — rub off any shoots below that.

Then choose 3–4 strong branches that point outwards and are spread around and up the trunk (not all bunched at one spot). These become the main frame; cut the rest back.

Always cut back to a bud or a branch, and cut cleanly — ragged stubs die back and let in rot.

On older, bearing trees, prune lightly after each harvest: take out dead, crossing and inward-growing shoots to keep the middle open, and hold the tree at a height you can still reach and pick.

Keep a clear, weed-free ring around the trunk — out to at least a stride (1 m) while the tree is small, and wider as the canopy spreads — always out past the drip line (the circle on the ground under the outer leaves, where the feeding roots sit).

Weed the ring by hand or hoe shallowly every month or so — deep hoeing near the trunk cuts the surface feeding roots.

Cover the cleared ring with a thick mulch of dry grass, leaves or straw to hold moisture and smother weeds.

Keep the mulch a hand-span (about 20 cm) clear of the trunk — mulch piled against the bark stays wet and rots the stem.

Once a month, walk to each tree and look closely at the new shoots, leaf undersides and stems.

Mango hoppers: small wedge-shaped insects on the shoots that hop away when you shake the branch, with sticky honeydew and black sooty mould (a soot-like coating) on the leaves below.

Scale insects: tiny fixed bumps or discs stuck to twigs and leaf undersides — they don't move — with the same sticky leaves and sooty mould.

Mealybugs: white, cottony, waxy blobs tucked into the leaf-joints and shoot tips, often with ants running to the honeydew.

Look for dieback (shoot tips going brown and dying back) and for small, narrow, bunched 'little leaves' on short shoots — a sign of zinc (ZN) shortage.

A few pests on a strong tree are fine — act only if they're spreading or the sooty mould is climbing. Wipe off small colonies, or open the matching pest guide.

Water young trees 2–3 times a week while they're small, easing off as they establish and their roots go deep. Keep the basin soil moist, never waterlogged.

Feed little and often during the growing flushes: spread a small handful of a nitrogen-rich compound fertiliser in a ring on the moist soil at the drip line (under the outer leaves), and a bit more each year as the tree grows.

Keep fertiliser off the trunk and off wet leaves, and cover it or water it in so it doesn't blow off or gas away.

If you see 'little-leaf' — small, narrow, bunched leaves, a zinc (ZN) shortage — a zinc spray on the new flush corrects it.

In the third or fourth year, when the young tree first flowers and sets a few fruit, pull off the little fruits (and most of the flower panicles) by hand while they're still small.

Let the tree put that strength into wood, leaves and roots instead of a handful of early fruit.

From the next year, let it start carrying a light crop and build up from there.

From about three months before your trees normally flower, stop watering and let the tree go dry and 'rest'. In most places this lines up with the cool, dry season.

Let the soil dry down and the leafy growth pause — this dry, cool stress is the signal that tells the tree to flower all at once rather than in dribs and drabs.

Hold off water right up to flowering. Only start again after the fruit has set (the next stage).

If rain falls during this rest you can't stop it — but don't add to it, and be ready to protect the flowers from disease if the weather turns damp.

From when the panicles (the big branched flower sprays) start to show, check several trees every 6–8 days.

Anthracnose: black, sunken spots on the flower stalks and flowers, and whole panicles turning black and dying (this is called blossom blight). It runs fastest in wet, humid weather.

Powdery mildew: a white, powdery dust on the flowers, flower stalks and young leaves; affected flowers dry up and drop, leaving bare stalks.

Mango hoppers: small wedge-shaped insects that hop off the panicle when you tap it, plus honeydew and black sooty mould — heavy hoppers strip the flowers.

If disease is starting and the weather is damp, start the protective spray (next task); if hoppers are heavy on the flowers, treat for them.

Spray only if your area is humid or the weather turns damp at flowering — in a dry flowering you may not need it at all. Your recommendation gives the product and amount for your trees.

For anthracnose, use a copper spray; for powdery mildew (the white dust), use a sulphur spray. Start as the flowers open and repeat every 10–14 days while the weather stays damp.

'Protectant' means it must be on the flowers before the disease arrives — so spray ahead of wet spells, not after the panicles have already blackened.

Cover the whole panicle with a fine, even mist, to the point of run-off.

Spray safely: cover your skin, eyes, nose and mouth; spray in the cool of the day with the wind behind you; keep it off food and the water source; and wash yourself and your clothes afterwards.

As flowering begins, hang fruit-fly traps in the shade of the canopy — a few per tree, or spread through the orchard.

Use a methyl-eugenol lure for the Bactrocera fruit flies, or a terpinyl-acetate lure for the Ceratitis (Natal / Mediterranean) flies — these lures pull in and drown the male flies.

Check the traps each time you scout: a rising catch is your early warning that fruit-fly season is starting.

Keep the traps going right through fruit development, topping up or replacing the lure as directed.

Wait until the little fruits have set (about a month after flowering) before you start watering again — watering earlier, during flowering, spoils the set.

Then water steadily every 7–10 days through fruit development and fill, more often in heat and on sandy soils that dry fast.

Aim for even, steady moisture — don't swing between bone-dry and flooded, which cracks and drops fruit.

Keep it up until close to harvest, then ease off as the fruit matures.

From fruit-set onwards, check the developing fruit and the traps every 6–8 days.

Fruit-fly stings: tiny sunken punctures oozing a bead of sap on the fruit — inside, a maggot is starting. Stung fruit later softens, rots and drops.

Bacterial black spot: black, angular, slightly raised spots — often with star-shaped cracks — on the fruit skin and along the leaf veins, sometimes oozing.

Anthracnose on fruit: black, sunken spots that spread, especially as the fruit begins to ripen.

Mango seed weevil: you often can't see it from outside — cut open a fallen fruit and look for tunnels or a grub in the flesh and seed. If you find it, clearing every fallen fruit is your main weapon.

On the first stings or a rising trap catch, start baiting (next task), and collect and bury all fallen fruit twice a week to break the pests' cycle.

When the fruits are about marble-to-egg size (roughly 6–10 weeks after flowering), slip a paper or newspaper bag (or a purpose-made fruit bag) over each one and tie it loosely at the stalk.

Leave a small open corner or hole at the bottom so rain drains out and damp doesn't build up inside.

Choose healthy, unstung fruit and handle the little fruit gently so you don't knock it off.

Leave the bags on right up to harvest.

Start when scouting shows the first stings or the trap catch climbs — usually from the small-fruit stage on.

Protein bait is a mix of a protein food the flies love plus a small dose of insecticide. Spot-spray it as coin-sized patches on the shady side of the tree — the flies come to feed and die. You don't spray the whole tree or the fruit.

Repeat the bait spots every 7–10 days, and again after heavy rain washes them off.

Sanitation is half the battle: collect and bury (or feed to animals) all fallen and stung fruit twice a week so no maggots finish their cycle in your orchard.

Spray safely: cover skin, eyes and nose; keep bait off the fruit and off food; and respect the pre-harvest interval (the label's wait between the last treatment and picking) as harvest nears. Wash afterwards.

Start checking for maturity from about 3.5 months after flowering (100 days). Look for the fruit filling out: the shoulders (the two humps beside the stalk) rise level with or above the stalk, and the beak (the little nose at the tip) fills.

Look for the colour break — the skin lightening from dark to lighter green, and the flesh near the seed turning yellow or orange when you cut one open.

Float test: a mature fruit sinks or floats low in a bucket of water. An immature one bobs high on the surface — if it bobs high and the shoulders haven't filled, it's not ready: leave it on the tree another week and check again.

Cut or snap each fruit leaving a short stalk stub about a finger-joint long (3–5 cm) — this slows the sap that stains the skin. Use a pole-picker with a bag for high fruit so it doesn't bruise on the ground.

Pick over several passes, every 5–10 days, taking the ready fruit each time and leaving the rest to fill. Handle gently — mango bruises easily — and keep picked fruit out of the sun.

Desap within minutes of picking. Either leave the short stalk stub on and lay the fruit stalk-down so the sap drips away from the skin, or dip the fruit briefly in a mild lime, alum or detergent solution to break the sap so it can't scar.

Keep the fresh sap off the skin of every fruit — one dribble leaves a black scar.

Then give a hot-water dip: about 50–55 °C for 20–30 minutes. This controls anthracnose and stem-end rot and kills fruit-fly eggs in the skin. Use a thermometer — too hot cooks the fruit, too cool does nothing.

Ripen under control in a cool, airy, shaded place, and sort out any bruised or diseased fruit so one rotten mango doesn't spoil the rest.