Mango

**Siting:** Mango thrives in full sun on well-drained soils tolerant of a wide pH range, growing best in a warm, frost-free climate with a well-defined winter dry season; rain and high humidity during flowering reduce fruit set. Trees grow from sea level to 1200 m in the tropics, though most commercial plantings stay below 600 m, and they can put on more than 1.5 m of height a year under favourable conditions.

**Care:** Established trees tolerate moderate drought and salt spray and need ample moisture rather than constant irrigation. Regular pruning is needed to build a strong structure, since branches are prone to breaking in storms, and trees are propagated by budding or veneer grafting onto seedling rootstock rather than grown on their own roots.

**Pests:** Mango is sensitive to pests and diseases, most notably scale insects, which are often followed by sooty mould, and the Mediterranean fruit fly. Anthracnose is a serious fungal disease affecting both fruit and leaves.

**Handling:** The sap, pollen and fruit skin contain compounds related to urushiol, the irritant found in poison ivy, and some people develop skin or allergic reactions from contact with the tree.

Mango flowers in mid- to late winter and the fruit matures in early to mid-summer, four to five months after flowering. Yields vary widely: an average hectare produces under 5 tonnes but can reach 20–30 tonnes under good management, while a single tree may bear 200–300 kg of fruit in a heavy cropping year and as little as 5 kg in a poor one.

**Culinary:** The ripe fruit is eaten fresh as a dessert fruit and is notably rich in vitamin A; it is also eaten green, and processed into pickles, pulp, jam, chutney, or frozen and dried for later use.

**Ornamental and shade:** Beyond fruit, mango is planted as a hedge and shade tree in home gardens and larger landscapes, and its dense, spreading canopy is used in agroforestry systems such as home gardens and silvopasture to shelter both animals and people.

**Medicinal:** In Ayurvedic and other traditional South Asian medicine, mango has reportedly been used for over 4,000 years, with different parts of the tree — bark, leaves, seeds, flowers and kernels — historically employed by practitioners in remedies for ailments such as diarrhoea, dysentery, asthma, bronchitis, cough and toothache.

**Industrial:** The bark's tannins have traditionally been used for dyeing, and the tree has also supplied timber and gum for practical use.

Mango descends from wild Mangifera trees native to tropical Asia, with the genus most diverse in Borneo, Java, Sumatra and the Malay Peninsula; Mangifera indica itself originated in the region spanning northeastern India, Bangladesh and Myanmar. Cultivation in South and Southeast Asia since ancient times gave rise to two long-recognised cultivar lineages, broadly Indian and Southeast Asian, and the tree spread with human migration throughout the tropics and subtropics, reaching Hawai‘i before 1825 and most other Pacific islands within the past century.