Mango is one of my favorite fruit. The privilege of living in a tropical country like Indonesia means that I can enjoy mango in season every twice a year! We have many varieties, with various shape, fragrance, texture and taste.
Recently I have become very obsessed with planting mango trees besides citrus! Ever since I started gardening, mango tree has been in my top planting list. Last year I bought a local variety called Harum Manis (literally translated into Sweet & Fragrant) from a local nursery. It was still a small plant but they told me it was grafted. Garden enthusiasts usually like to buy grafted fruit trees in pots because it is much more practical and success guaranteed.
After my first success with Harum Manis, this year I added a Thai variety into my collection: Please meet Nam Dok Mai!
Nam Dok Mai is famous for its characteristics of thick flesh and small seed. When it's ripen it will be sweet smelling and the peels golden yellow.
There's one thing I should warn you when buying mango trees in pots from any nursery, you should be careful to inspect the tree prior to purchase because plants in the nursery are prone to pests and diseases. Just like my experience with this tree. When I bought it I had spotted some brown spots or bumps on the leaves. I thought, by cutting the contracted leaves off would solve the problem, but it didn't. Every other day, I find new leaves with these spots/bumps, mostly on younger leaves. These spots/bumps are actually caused by the mango leaf gall midge (Procontarinia Matteiana), also called mango leaf curl midge. It can cause yield loss up to 70% and low quality fruit. Mango leaf curl midge lay eggs into the leaf tissue that softens and blisters. The spots become red and galls form shortly in 7 days. The galls grow up to a size of 3-4 mm. When matures, the adult galls emerge from the lower side of the leaves.
To control this pest, we can prune the highly infested leaves and burn them and clean the tree floor off the infested leaves to avoid the insects move into the soil and pupate. Ploughing the orchard to expose the pupae to sun so it will die. As for botanical control we can mix 30 ml neem oil with 1 ltr of soapy water, shake well and spray.
You may notice that the leaves have holes in it as the result of my piercing the spots/ galls before the spots/galls turn into insect. But I don't suggest this to you since it will reduce the leaf photosintetic area and affect the tree growth.
