Lychee

Planting: Lychee trees are propagated by air-layering or marcottage rather than seed, since seedlings do not come true, and are typically spaced 20 to 30 feet apart in full sun, sited away from buildings and protected from strong wind that can catch the dense canopy. They tolerate soils from sand to clay but do best in well-drained ground with a pH between 6 and 7.5, since waterlogged or heavy clay soils can encourage root disease.

Watering: The tree has a shallow root system and high water demand, so mulch helps it through hot, dry spells, but growers often withhold water for six to eight weeks before flowering to encourage fruit set and then increase irrigation gradually afterward, since too much water right after fruiting can cause fruit drop. A period of cool weather, roughly 100 to 200 hours between 32 and 45°F, is needed to trigger flowering even though the tree is otherwise tropical in habit.

Feeding: Young trees are prone to fertilizer burn and should not be fed while new growth is flushing, and on mature trees nitrogen is withheld in February and March so the tree sets fruit rather than pushing vegetative growth; micronutrients such as manganese, zinc, and iron are applied during the growing season, and iron deficiency can appear in alkaline soil.

The lychee erinose mite is described as the most serious pest, attacking leaves, stems, flower panicles, and fruit and capable of cutting fruit production by as much as 80 percent, though it does not kill mature trees. Scales, moths, root weevils, and nematodes are also reported pests.

Among diseases, anthracnose, mushroom root rot, parasitic lichen, and red algae affect lychee, with mushroom root rot more likely where oaks previously grew on the site; root disease problems are also more common on heavy clay soils, and waterlogging is noted to cause trouble for the shallow root system.

Fruit ripens on the tree over several weeks between roughly May and July, with peak production in June, and should be left to color fully before picking since it does not ripen further once cut. Clusters are harvested by cutting the main stem several inches above the fruit rather than pulling individual fruit.

Once picked, lychee keeps in the refrigerator for about five to ten days but is considered best eaten soon after harvest; the fruit is also sold fresh, frozen, canned, and dried.

Culinary: Lychee is grown primarily for its fruit, which is eaten fresh for its sweet, subacid, grape-like flesh and is also canned, frozen, or dried for later use.

Ornamental: With its glossy evergreen foliage, dense rounded canopy, and bronze-red new growth, the tree is also planted as a specimen, shade, screen, or hedge plant in home landscapes.

Medicinal: In China, litchi seeds left over from eating the fruit have traditionally been used for relief of inflammatory pain, a use tied to the phenolic compounds they contain.

Lychee is native to southern China, traditionally linked to the Kwangtung and Fukien provinces, where the dry winters and hot, humid summers match the seasonal cues the tree still needs to fruit. Cultivation in China has been documented since the 11th century, and the fruit was prized enough that emperors are said to have had bearing trees dug up and transported so ripe fruit would be available on their arrival elsewhere in the country.

From this Chinese center, the tree spread through Southeast and South Asia and later reached the wider world, arriving in Jamaica in 1775 and ripening its first fruit in Florida in 1916, with smaller-scale cultivation later established around the Mediterranean, in South Africa, and in Hawaii.