[HN Gopher] Growing a mango tree from seed - one year time lapse...
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Growing a mango tree from seed - one year time lapse [video]
Author : bookofjoe
Score : 425 points
Date : 2022-02-12 13:35 UTC (9 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.youtube.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.youtube.com)
| cwkoss wrote:
| I really want a solar powered time lapse camera that takes a
| photo around noon every day, saves to SD card.
|
| Would be great for plant time lapses.
|
| I haven't been able to find anyone who's done this already. It
| seems like there are trail cams and similar that have all the
| parts, so this should be possible to manufacture for a price
| point of around $50, and I think it would be an amazing product:
| I bet every gardening enthusiast would want one.
|
| Anyone know of a sku that already exists? I Google it a couple
| times a year, still haven't found it. Anyone want to get this
| made, maybe send me one as thanks, and you keep all the profits
| you reap? :-D. I really just want this to exist.
|
| (Happy to 3d model prototype housings to help! But I don't know
| EE. Chris at mckoss dot com)
| andai wrote:
| I wonder if there's any way to do crowdfunding for products
| that don't exist yet. I don't mean kickstarter, in that case
| there's someone who wants to make the thing already. I mean for
| things where there are a lot of people who want it to exist,
| and could pledge some cash to motivate someone to make the damn
| thing.
|
| One I've been waiting for since 2008 is a general purpose
| epaper tablet / laptop, and I see its nonexistence lamented
| here at least once a year.
| system2 wrote:
| I think many useful product idea creators will not share
| their ideas because it would suck to see someone turning your
| idea into reality and potentially make money. And average
| people with no tech or creation skills come up with the worst
| ideas.
| te0006 wrote:
| >One I've been waiting for since 2008 is a general purpose
| epaper tablet
|
| Although this might be not 100% what you want - you are aware
| that decent epaper Android devices e.g. from Onyx have been
| available for a few years now? Have a look e.g. at the BOOX
| Note Air2. Of course they are marketed as e-readers, and are
| quite pricey.
| cwkoss wrote:
| Bonus fun idea: I think if you used a synchronized array of
| about a dozen of these you could use photogrammetry to make an
| animated 3d model of plant growth, which I would love.
| smogcutter wrote:
| Not exactly what you're asking for (at least price wise), but
| there are solar power adapters for trail cams:
| https://www.basspro.com/shop/en/tactacam-external-solar-pane...
| cwkoss wrote:
| Yep, I've seen solar trail cams, just none that have a
| setting for taking a picture at the same time each day.
|
| I expect if you eliminated the need for taking video and
| motion detection, should be able to get away with smaller
| panel and battery. Most trail cams also have IR modes, don't
| need that, which would drop cost as well.
| Scoundreller wrote:
| this should work as long as it supports charging while in
| use (hook up solar panel to usb and done):
| https://www.brinno.com/time-lapse-camera/TLC120
|
| Or roll your own: It's overkill, but lots of solar-powered
| battery-backed raspberry pi systems out there. If it only
| needs to run for a few minutes/day. You can undersize the
| solar if you can skip cloudy days when there's not much
| growth anyway.
|
| Maybe an old laptop with webcam or some digital cameras
| with 'remote' triggers could fill the role.
|
| An RTC chip with alarm function could send a power-on
| signal every day and at least a pi can self-shutoff once
| the job is complete.
|
| "Not all RTC chips have alarm functions but a few that do
| are the DS3231 (Maxim Integrated), MCP79410 (Microchip) and
| ISL12026 (Intersil). Here, a DS3231M is used to construct a
| simple, but fully functional, RTC building block and,
| further, to construct an example RTC-based switch."
|
| https://www.allaboutcircuits.com/projects/build-
| programmable...
| ranger207 wrote:
| Raspberry Pi Zero with a camera module and case? Plus solar
| panel and battery, and maybe some waterproofing. Hmm, a RasPi
| would probably be too power-hungry...
| exhilaration wrote:
| The perfect video for a quiet Saturday morning. Thank you.
| aaaaaaaaaaab wrote:
| There's something fascinating about plants, creating living
| organic matter from just dirt, water and air. It's like alchemy!
| czernobog wrote:
| Can someone explain why the leaves started to die by the end of
| it?
| pvaldes wrote:
| Depleted soil leading to -> the margin of the leaves start
| drying -> so they add hormones or manure -> the plant suddenly
| experience a "multi branching" event at the end.
|
| Mangos are sensible to mineral deficiencies.
| Foobar8568 wrote:
| I tried to "grow" a couple of mango trees in Switzerland on
| my balcony, but they all died within 1 or 2 years, I think I
| burnt one with too much fertilizer, another one due to the
| weather being too dry and one, I am not too sure but I
| suspected not enough mineral as it took almost 2 years, I
| hoped it would grow :(
| pvaldes wrote:
| Is just not an easy plant to grow in your climate.
| Boerworz wrote:
| According to the video description, the tree got a pest
| infestation around day 210. I assume that's what's responsible.
| HarHarVeryFunny wrote:
| I wonder if it's coincidence or not, but I once grew a mango
| from seed in the US, kept indoors, and it did similarly -
| grew great for about a year (got to about 2 foot tall), then
| got sick and died. I wonder if there's something in the US
| that mango trees arn't used to dealing with?
|
| Very interesting to watch grow though - each set of leaves
| starting out floppy and purple then stiffening up and turning
| green, just like the one in the video.
|
| I just planted the whole mango pit as-is, without removing
| the inner seed, and it had no problem germinating.
| atulatul wrote:
| Mostly, it is due to weather and the direction of sunlight (and
| due to pests, etc.). Also leaves at the top, those on the
| outside get more exposed to sunlight and the plant allocates
| these leaves more chlorophyll for synthesis (hence green).
| Comparatively, leaves on the inside do not get much sunlight
| and serve no purpose, so to say. So the plant/ tree sucks the
| chlorophyll back from these leaves. Now such leaves which do
| not take part in synthesis can expose the plant to too cold/
| too hot weather due to their surfaces area. So the plant/tree
| sheds them. Of course too severe weather will impact all leaves
| so in winter etc trees are bare.
|
| If interested, I highly recommend (not a pure science book)
| Hidden Life Of Trees https://www.amazon.com/Hidden-Life-Trees-
| Communicate_Discove...
| User23 wrote:
| This is interesting. Do mangoes grow true from seed? I have some
| apple trees grown from seed and they're effectively ornamentals.
| I suppose I could ferment and distill the fruit, but I'm
| certainly not going to eat it.
| merciBien wrote:
| I found a different video from a Mango and Avocado grower who
| says he typically grafts in a branch of a tree with good fruit
| behavior onto a newly sprouted mango plant. He says letting an
| ungrafted plant grow to maturity will produce a tree, but will
| probably not produce a good crop of fruit, due to the
| variability of DNA.
|
| https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Q2czF7QBxPs
|
| Made me wonder if that's why industrial produce doesn't taste
| as good as natural. Could removing genetic diversity in fruit
| cause mutations to creep in?
| pvaldes wrote:
| Is a very satisfying feeling to see the new leaves deploying.
|
| The video show very well the continuous grow. Something
| interesting happened at the end, probably hormones added.
| atulatul wrote:
| When roots grow/ gather more food, the tree will grow and
| branch out. So that it can get sunlight from all directions. I
| have seen this even without adding hormones/ fertilizers. The
| effect is probably more dramatic due to time lapse.
| rs999gti wrote:
| > new leaves deploying.
|
| Atmospheric carbon capture visualized
| gus_massa wrote:
| I eat mango (10 per year?), but I never opened the shell of the
| seed. I thought it was the seed.
|
| Does anyone know why the leaves are initially so dark and then
| become lighter? Is that common in plants?
| bluecatswim wrote:
| >Does anyone know why the leaves are initially so dark and then
| become lighter? Is that common in plants?
|
| From what I've seen it's common in at least a subset of plants,
| that fresh leaves have a very distinctive red-ish colour.
| pvaldes wrote:
| > why the leaves are initially so dark and then become lighter?
| Is that common?
|
| Yes. Red pigments are a common defense against cold and
| radiation. They are masked later by the green pigments.
| atulatul wrote:
| Yes, generally dark colors absorb more light, and young
| leaves do not have any chlorophyll (so not green)
| smoyer wrote:
| I've grown avocados and it's a very similar process - the
| leaves of avocados also start dark and get lighter. Curiously,
| I had a fairly large inside plant that I set out during nice
| weather and it got "sunburned".
| cinntaile wrote:
| Sunburn is indeed the appropriate term. The plant is not used
| to the strong solar energy so it gets damaged. Most plants
| will do just fine if you gradually introduce them to more
| real sunlight.
| bradrn wrote:
| > Does anyone know why the leaves are initially so dark and
| then become lighter? Is that common in plants?
|
| I've noticed the same thing in frangipani. I assume it has
| something to do with the same amount of chlorophyll being
| distributed over a greater area, but that's just a guess.
|
| Also note that the leaves don't just get lighter as they grow:
| the older ones also start to become dark again as they die.
| _Microft wrote:
| Here is a guess.
|
| Some nutritients / elements are rare and plants need to
| manage them carefully. That also means that they need to
| protect themselves against animals feeding on them. For that,
| they develop antifeedants [0] for example. Maybe plants
| develop the structure of leaves and antifeedants first before
| eventually loading it with chlorophyll [1] for which e.g.
| magnesium is required (no idea if _that_ counts as rare but
| it is certainly harder to acquire than hydrogen, oxygen or
| carbon.
|
| [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antifeedant
|
| [1]
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chlorophyll#Chemical_structure
| joshuaissac wrote:
| > I eat mango (10 per year?), but I never opened the shell of
| the seed. I thought it was the seed.
|
| The seed can be planted with the husk, but removing it speeds
| up the germination because the embryo can access light and
| water more easily.
| samwillis wrote:
| I assume they evolved to have the inedible husk to prevent
| damage while being eaten and increase the distance from the
| original tree, effectively delaying germination. (If you can
| describe evolution as having an intention...)
| mikro2nd wrote:
| Many seeds need a dormancy period before germinating, and
| frequently a husk or germination-inhibiting coating
| (Tomatoes) surrounds the seed as a delay mechanism: the
| coating/husk has to rot before the seed gets contact with
| soil and water. For many it's way of ensuring that seeds
| don't germinate at the start of Winter. For others there's
| a (sometimes long!) maturation process that happens within
| the seed (Macadamias) before they're ready to sprout. Other
| times the husk is there to protect the seed while it goes
| through the gut of some animal (often birds) so that it
| gets transported well away from the parent plant.
|
| Nature is pretty clever, imho.
| tyjaksn wrote:
| Another example of a seed with long germination time is
| the coco de mer[1], coming in at 2 years. It also happens
| to be the largest seed of any plant.
|
| [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lodoicea
| culi wrote:
| Yes this is exactly it. Mangoes lost their megafaunal
| partners (giant sloths?) so they're evolutionary
| anachronisms
|
| Relevant xkcd: https://xkcd.com/1259/
| leodriesch wrote:
| Isn't there a movie about it, the incredible husk or
| something? Idk I'm not that into movies
| pvaldes wrote:
| I liked the part where the husk turn green.
| samwillis wrote:
| And bigger... you could say it grows...
| nanna wrote:
| The incredible hulk?
| rs999gti wrote:
| Aren't mangos like avocados, where the tasty fruit is grown from
| cloned grafts and not from seed?
| barathr wrote:
| Polyembryonic mango varieties can be true to seed, whereas
| there are no polyembryonic avocados (so they only rarely
| produce decent fruit from seed -- grafting is much more
| important for avocados).
| aaaaaaaaaaab wrote:
| Some varieties grow true to seed, others don't.
| jeffwass wrote:
| On a similar note, my friend made a 24 hour time-lapse video of
| the Prayer Plant (Red Maranta), collapsed into 90 seconds.
|
| The leaves close up at daytime, but open up at night, through a
| process called Nyctinasty. It's amazing how motile plants can be.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BhkkZAx4vGM
| sanxiyn wrote:
| This is a demonstration of truly advanced level of technology. I,
| of lower tech level, appropriately tremble in awe.
| dsign wrote:
| You poor thing. If you were a Homo Sapiens, you will be made of
| even superior technology. Therefore I assume you are one of
| those flaccid AIs that Sapiens is so infatuated with these
| days. Sapiens should be properly going nuts about playing with
| the tech it is made of, instead of wasting time playing with
| mud...I mean, matrices.
| beecafe wrote:
| Unfortunately, the makers of that wonderful technology
| neglected to leave a manual, process chart or even a blog
| post, so we have to recreate it from the mud our way.
| jamesmaniscalco wrote:
| For those interested in growing tropical & sub-tropical plants
| from seed - mangoes, avocados, citrus, papayas, etc. - Melvin Wei
| [0] has a great youtube channel. There is a certain hacker spirit
| to his approach, with lots of experimentation in getting these
| somewhat atypical houseplants to grow in pots.
|
| [0] https://www.youtube.com/c/TheMelvinWei
| DrBoring wrote:
| From personal experience, the easiest way to sprout an avocado
| pit is to throw it in some moist dirt and put clear plastic
| over it to keep the moisture in.
|
| They take about 30 to 45 days to sprout. And the success rate
| it about 75%. (though I've never been scientific about it, so
| my numbers may be off)
|
| My setup is two 8qt plastic storage containers. One for dirt,
| and one to trap the moisture.
| sabujp wrote:
| People here complaining about good mangoes not being available in
| the US haven't been to CA. You can get a box of 14-15 alphonso or
| ataulfo mangoes for $10-12 at local indian and asian stores
| around late summer. These come in from Mexico and near the
| beginning of the season are still not yet ripe (on purpose so
| they don't spoil in the store). Wait a few days after purchasing
| them and then they become really sweet.
|
| Yes, also when things are in season those fruits and vegetables
| taste better in your tropical/subtropical countries, but that's
| the problem with places like India, when things aren't in season
| it's difficult to get those items or they are really expensive
| and really bad quality. In the US (esp. in CA!) I can get decent
| quality fruits and vegetables almost year round and I can grow
| lots of things on my own, freeze them, and then enjoy them year
| round too. The open stall markets where the majority of Indians
| do their grocery shopping only have seasonal vegetables, there's
| 0 refrigeration. The chicken and fish areas are full of blood,
| it's very unhygienic and if you want beef or pork, good luck.
|
| Also in India the concept of eating raw leafy green salads is
| completely foreign and due to lack of food hygiene there's no
| demand for eating raw lettuces. The blistering heat also doesn't
| help for growing kales, chards, and microgreens. Leafy vegetables
| must be cooked or flash boiled. Again, you can get microgreens at
| the supermarkets but it's more expensive than in the US and just
| like everyone else there I'm not going to eat raw leafy greens
| for fear of getting food poisoning. People in the US complaining
| about low quality food have no idea how good they have it, even
| with the few ecoli scares you have a few times of the year, you
| can be sure major stores pull the bad produce. Before I go to
| India and immediately after coming back I eat tons of salad
| loaded with avocados, various types of nuts/seeds, various types
| of berries, olives, and various other fruits and vegetables. I
| find myself craving these items a few days into my month long
| India trips. It's easy to eat and live a healthy lifestyle in the
| US, not so much in India.
| yumraj wrote:
| > 14-15 alphonso or ataulfo mangoes
|
| Alphonso and ataulfo are not the same thing, not even close
| except they are both mangoes.
|
| Alphonso is a uniquely fragrant and flavorful variety from
| India which is very rare to find in the US but you should be
| able to find it canned in pulp form.
|
| Ataulfo is an ordinary mango from Mexico that is available
| everywhere in CA, including in organic form at Costco.
| walrus01 wrote:
| If one wants to make a time lapse video of this very cheap, you
| can do it with as little as a raspberry pi zero w ($10, if you
| can get one?), a 4GB to 8GB sized microsd card for raspbian, a $5
| USB-A to microUSB adapter, and any old USB webcam supported by
| Linux.
|
| When I did this the pi would acquire an image every N minutes,
| save it with a sequentially timestamped filename into a working
| directory. Then another system in my house would periodically
| rsync the contents of the pi's working directory to itself. From
| there, it's a one line ffmpeg command to turn the series of JPG
| or PNG files into a video at your choice of time interval/frame
| rate, resolution and codec.
| shisisms wrote:
| It's amazing to think that on a societal wide level we refuse to
| ascribe consciousness to that which clearly shares all the traits
| of being alive and self-aware.
|
| That, whatever it is, must be conscious and not just "on some
| level" as if humans have retained some special social status
| across species.
| betwixthewires wrote:
| I've got one under a year old. It was fantastic to watch the red
| sprout (I got 2 sprouts, a twin tree from one seed) and the black
| leaves grow, the thing doubled in size daily for a couple of
| weeks. The black leaves double daily until they start to turn
| green.
|
| I'm under a year in with this thing and I was wondering how it
| would start branching out, if leaves would become branches or
| what. Seeing the budding at the top at the end was pretty cool.
| Now I know what to expect.
| atulatul wrote:
| If interested in plants/ trees, I highly recommend (not a pure
| science book) Hidden Life Of Trees https://www.amazon.com/Hidden-
| Life-Trees-Communicate_Discove...
| ch4s3 wrote:
| I thought it was quite good, if a little reflexively anti-
| urban. But it definitely makes trees seem super fascinating.
| bookofjoe wrote:
| Also Richard Powers' 2019 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel "The
| Overstory." It's superb.
| hashin wrote:
| These time lapse videos are an incredible tool to teach kids
| about plant growth. It was really hard for me at school to
| visualise plants as living beings and their "life" was always an
| abstract concept.
|
| The channel has some more interesting videos. I wish someone did
| videos to demonstrate phototropism, hydrotropism etc. It would be
| much cooler to have those videos around, which could be used to
| explain such concepts to kids.
| joosters wrote:
| The latest BBC nature series Green Planet has lots of excellent
| time lapse videos of all kinds of plants, well worth a watch.
|
| There are some clips available on youtube, e.g.
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SM-Ilh2lHZk
| hericium wrote:
| I would appreciate some Starship Troopers-like "do you want to
| know more?" link.
| DocFeind wrote:
| oddly satisfying to watch
| steeve wrote:
| That was great, thank you.
| carapace wrote:
| The motility of plants is fascinating. The growth patterns of the
| leaves, for example, are utterly mesmerizing. I have a thicket
| bean plant that raises and lowers its leaves in response to
| changes in light levels. The motion is too slow to see normally
| but with a time lapse video it becomes visible, and you can see
| that the plant "flaps" its leaves.
|
| Time scaling (slower or faster) is almost like an additional
| sense, in a way similar to micro- and tele-scopes, eh?
| JanSt wrote:
| our tech is so primitive compared to the ability and complexity
| of life. Out of a tiny part, a complex machine with the ability
| to grow, harvest energy and replicate comes into being.
| Astounding.
| _benj wrote:
| That's what I found incredible from these videos, specially the
| one in his channel that produce fruits (eggplants, peppers,
| etc...).
|
| The amount of chemical synthesis (I know nothing about
| chemistry) from the raw materials of dirt and water and light
| into the crazy amount of nutrients are fibers and whatnot found
| in a plant is absolutely astonishing!
| bradrn wrote:
| Amazing video! I recently found some ginkgo seeds and have also
| been trying to make them grow. Some had naturally germinated, so
| I tried to replicate the conditions where I found those ones
| (covered with ~1cm of soil, in a shady spot, receiving some
| rain), but no luck as of now. Perhaps I should try soaking some
| in water in a closed container as shown in the video. (Assuming
| it is water, of course; a clear liquid could be nearly anything.)
| joak wrote:
| Ginkgos are peculiar plants, with ovules and spermatozoids. I
| don't know if the term "seed" applies well. You need an
| (fertilized) egg to grow the plant.
|
| https://kwanten.home.xs4all.nl/ovule.htm
| xbmcuser wrote:
| What water are you using tap water might be okay for larger
| plants but might have chemicals that would kill germinating
| seeds.
| bradrn wrote:
| I've been using water from a hosepipe, so yes, tap water.
| However we have also been getting an unusual amount of rain
| recently, so that's been watering the plants also.
| ramshanker wrote:
| Something is so beautiful about this video. Totally awe....
| lawkwok wrote:
| It is beautiful for sure. Knowing that long after we all pass,
| when society and technology is unimaginable, that this little
| seed will still know what to do with a little bit of water...
|
| Yet being able to witness the passage of time outside of the
| scale of time provokes a mini existential crisis for me.
|
| The Youtube channel says they will post another video when the
| first fruit is born in 2026. It's kind of like watching babies
| growing up. You know that in five years, they will still be a
| baby, but 5 years to us adults could mean a new job, the death
| of someone, a completely different life philosophy.
| Ozzie_osman wrote:
| I grew up in Egypt, my dad is from a town on the Suez Canal
| called Ismailia, famous for its mangoes. We would wait the whole
| year for mango season (August/September). As kids, our clothes
| would all get mango stains. Our parents would make us take our
| shirts off before we eat them to avoid that.
|
| I moved to the US, and I haven't had a good mango here. When
| friends visit Egypt, I tell them to get mangoes (in season,
| around September), especially a variety known as Eweis. They get
| obsessed. I've never figured out why the US just doesn't have
| good mangoes, I'm guessing they're hard to grow locally or ship.
| Aterio wrote:
| Avocados in Gran Canaria are always awesome.
|
| Hard ones soft ones they are just great.
|
| In Germany? I still like them so much to risk buying them but
| it's a depressing gamble :-(
| culopatin wrote:
| Same with plums. I don't even know why they sell them in the
| us. It's like eating a ball of water. Think of the flavor of an
| ice slushie that's just the ice.
|
| I gave them plenty of chances, in every corner of the country,
| in every season I could find them. Always terrible.
| namdnay wrote:
| I was shocked by Melon in the US. I've been to NYC, Dallas,
| SF, everywhere the melons have no taste whatsoever. The nice
| orange colour is there, but there's little sweetness and
| absolutely none of the musk/nutmeg
| tehwebguy wrote:
| Have you visited Miami in season? I avoided them sue to
| allergies in the family but we had a few mango trees in our
| yard which would produce mangos so large they would fall off
| the tree and burst when they hit the ground.
| riedel wrote:
| Here is a video of a guy growing a variety of them in South
| Florida: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q2czF7QBxPs
|
| Bet they ar least taste better than super market stuff.
| However, I guess it is no business if you could sell them two
| months a year.
| walrus01 wrote:
| The quality of the mangos in Pakistan is also excellent, and by
| my subjective opinion 3 times better than what you can get in
| the USA.
| qrohlf wrote:
| There's a really good podcast about why you can't get middle
| eastern mangoes in the USA, and the resulting smuggling
| operations that have sprung up to serve this niche -
| "Underground Aams Trade". Highly recommended.
|
| https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/underground-aams-trade...
| radec wrote:
| Here is the RSS
|
| https://seesomethingsaysomething.libsyn.com/rss
| edge17 wrote:
| Some details for why in the discussion thread here:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28166646
| pseudostem wrote:
| I run an agri commodity trading startup (mostly bananas) in
| India. A few mango exporters I know complain about US import
| rules for mangoes. Apparently by regulation mangoes have to be
| immersed in hot water for 20 minutes. This destroys taste.
| mkoubaa wrote:
| Irradiation is going to be approved soon as an alternative if
| I understand correctly
| biztos wrote:
| I grew up without mangoes but now I live in Thailand and have
| fallen hopelessly, permanently in love with them.
|
| They are available all year, but varietals and prices vary
| wildly when it's not "season."
|
| There are also great mangoes in Spain and the Canary Islands,
| but they're very different and (I hate to say it!) not as loved
| by the locals as they should be.
|
| I have yet to encounter a decent mango in the US, but it's only
| been about a year since I started looking seriously, so maybe
| I'm just not clued in. Maybe Florida?
| 999900000999 wrote:
| Food in the United States is generally very bland.
|
| When I visited Greece, the food was so much better than
| anything else I've ever tasted. It's not one problem in the US,
| it's every level of our supply chain is geared towards mass
| market tasteless junk.
|
| Going out of my way to eat as much junk food as possible, I
| actually noticed I lost a bit of weight from the two weeks or
| so I spent in Europe.
|
| I'm hoping to live outside the United States for at least a few
| months to see if this was a fluke.
| incanus77 wrote:
| I live in the very un-sunny Pacific Northwest. I rarely see
| mangos, though I eat a lot of dried mango as snacks. I was
| introduced by my Asian-American partner who grew up eating it
| via her parents.
|
| Right now I am traveling in Mexico and craving fresh fruit,
| especially mango, everyday. So fresh, so refreshing, and so
| bright. It feels like vacation in your hand (or glass).
|
| Some American perspective for you.
| alfiedotwtf wrote:
| I remember sitting in a carabao mango tree in the Philippines
| and eating them until I got sick...
|
| Sadly, these days in Melbourne the majority of mangoes sold at
| supermarkets and fruit shops are Calypso mangoes, which are
| powdery, not as sweet, and not as juicy. I find this weird
| though given that 80% of mangoes produced in Australia are
| Kensington mangoes and yet are harder to find :(
| gumby wrote:
| A lot of tropical fruit is uninteresting in the USA: bananas,
| pineapple, mangoes etc have little flavor and typically one
| variety is available at most. I sometimes have 50 year old
| memories in dreams of eating fresh fruit and they are so
| different in form and flavor I wonder if they are
| hallucinations.
|
| But as you point out, they require a climate unavailable on the
| continent so have to be harvested unripe and transported a long
| distance. I should be amazed they exist at all.
|
| This supply chain aspect operates both ways: pineapples are
| grown in Hawaii and shipped to the mainland; as a result the
| only pineapples I've ever eaten there are the big flavorless
| ones sold all around the country. Hopefully the small flavor-
| packed ones are still grown locally and just provided to
| locals.
|
| It's not just tropical foods either. Everything from tomatoes,
| melons, and grains to chickens and turkeys have been selected
| and modified for the needs of the supply chain. Although
| flavor, texture, and, I understand even nutrition has suffered,
| the net result is that there is a lot less hunger, so I have to
| consider it a net positive.
|
| My hope is that widespread automation and cheap clean energy
| will allow more local production and make "small batch"
| varietals cheaper. And in such a world, instead of
| indiscriminately pouring herbicides and pesticides to protect
| the productive crops' robot labor can pluck the weeds and bugs
| individually from the crops which should improve the quality of
| the result.
| botverse wrote:
| I did once a website for the side project of a guy whose main
| business was making and licensing "maturation chambers" [1],
| basically containers where to put the unripe fruit with light
| and 90% humidity for shipping. Tomatoes go in smaller and
| green, but arrive bigger and red. If you factor in shipping,
| it makes sense to think that all the fruit would rot on
| arrival if you let it mature on the tree.
|
| [1] in Spanish "camaras de maduracion", not sure of the
| translation of this
| ornornor wrote:
| I've wondered a lot about that as well and I think this is
| not only the product of picking unripe fruits so that they
| can be harvested sooner and not go bad in transit, but also
| because of the hybridization of crops.
|
| There are companies working very hard at developing new
| variants of fruits and vegetables that grow faster, are less
| susceptible to pests, don't get damaged as much in transit,
| look like what consumers expect them to look like (no matter
| what the reality is), and smell good. Unfortunately, taste is
| never there. For instance have you ever noticed how hard
| tomatoes skin is at the supermarket vs the ones you grow
| yourself or even the "heirloom" variety? Tougher skin is not
| very pleasant but they survive shipping better.
|
| This is my hypothesis why fruits and vegs used to taste so
| much better. It's gotten worse over time with each generation
| of hybrids.
| horsawlarway wrote:
| Not really even a hypothesis.
|
| Farmers select for traits that increase profit. Since most
| markets don't let customers actually taste the product,
| they aren't choosing to buy it on that quality, and no one
| in the commercial space is trying to optimize it.
|
| Instead customers are buying fruit that LOOKS good - big,
| bright, colorful, blemish-free (survives transport without
| damage).
|
| So farmers plant fruits that will look good, survive
| transport, and have large yields. Unfortunately optimizing
| those qualities tends to get you terribly bland tasting
| fruit.
|
| Ironically - pre-industrial revolution, when most fruits
| were grown and consumed locally, it was the opposite -
| people tended to select for fruits that were good tasting.
| Ozzie_osman wrote:
| I learned that baby carrots were not actually "baby"
| (small carrots) when I was I my 20s, after consuming them
| for years.
|
| Baby carrots are carved from disfigured (but otherwise
| edible) carrots, because otherwise most people won't buy
| disfigured carrots.
| VBprogrammer wrote:
| > I should be amazed they exist at all.
|
| Exactly this. Go back a century and the idea of eating exotic
| fruits like these was the only available to the wealthiest.
|
| It's a shame in a way that bananas and the like have become
| ubiquitous, to the detriment of fruits which were locally
| available.
| gumby wrote:
| > It's a shame in a way that bananas and the like have
| become ubiquitous...
|
| I'm happy to be able to eat a banana; merely sorry that the
| ubiquitous one is such a boring variety.
|
| The consequences of the industrial monocrop banana will be
| solved soon one way or another: the cavendish is under
| attack and either it will be replaced or all bananas will
| go extinct. I suppose Hegel would have appreciated this
| example.
| hedora wrote:
| Bananas went (commercially) extinct decades ago. The
| things sold in stores today are a different fruit.
| wyclif wrote:
| You can still get the smaller, wilder variety in other
| places in the world. For instance, the Philippines.
| 2muchcoffeeman wrote:
| Every SE Asian country will have a few types of bananas
| available locally. Even Australia is jumping on the band
| wagon and I can get a couple more varieties now. I can
| even get plantains regularly.
|
| But we're talking about mangoes and bananas and
| pineapples and calling those "tropical fruit" when
| there's so many fruits in the tropics.
| PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
| I remember walking into a small village store in Costa
| Rica to be confronted by about 10 _named_ varieties of
| bananas, and noticing in the core a box just marked
| "apple". It was a cool inversion of the usual pattern in
| the US (and Europe).
| max-ibel wrote:
| Apple bananas in Hawaii are delicious and available at
| the local Costco.
|
| As you say, the "gros michel" cultivar is mostly dead
| commercially, although there are attempts to get a
| variant resistant to fungal disease.
|
| I'd like to taste a Gros Michel some day.
| creamynebula wrote:
| We have quite a few varieties regularly available in
| every corner store here in Brazil, they all taste quite
| good if you wait for them to ripe
| inglor_cz wrote:
| Bananas were actually already sold fairly widely in the US
| in 1922. United Fruit Company et al. imported them by the
| boatload.
|
| In fact, there was a crisis of supply caused by the Panama
| disease infesting the plantations, and people were very
| unhappy with that, because they got so used to the fruit.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yes!_We_Have_No_Bananas
| gumby wrote:
| > United Fruit Company et al. imported them by the
| boatload.
|
| ...assisted by the United States Marines, and in fact the
| origin of the term "Banana Republic".
|
| I was shocked by the tastelessness of the company name
| when the Banana Republic clothing chain opened up.
| antoniuschan99 wrote:
| I remember watching a documentary on the Titanic movie and
| they said oranges were considered luxury only the rich
| could afford
| hourislate wrote:
| >Go back a century and the idea of eating exotic fruits
| like these was the only available to the wealthiest.
|
| My father told me he was 27 years old when he ate his first
| banana. This was in Canada in 1950.
| gumby wrote:
| A few weeks after the fall of the Wall in Germany we were
| in the grocery store in western Niedersachsen (just a few
| km from the wall) and encountered a woman from the East.
| She asked my wife what the names of several fruits and
| vegetables were.
|
| For a couple of months after the wall came down it was
| impossible to find bananas. Germans love bananas!
| antoniuschan99 wrote:
| Very interesting. There's this supermarket that sold these
| mangos with the label "shipped by air" for like $30/box which
| had like ~6 of them and I was wondering who would buy such
| expensive fruit!
| dopidopHN wrote:
| As a whole, food quality is the us is not great. Specially
| fresh produce. The lack of affordable farmer market is my
| take on it. And I don't mean fancy farmer market for
| bourgeois boheme type.
|
| Where I grew up poor folks go to the market because it's
| cheaper than a supermarket.
| PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
| > Where I grew up poor folks go to the market because it's
| cheaper than a supermarket.
|
| It is very difficult, in fact almost impossible, for
| individual farmers to beat supermarket prices any more,
| largely thanks to vertical integration within agriculture
| and food processing.
|
| This means that by and large, the point of farmers markets
| now has to be mostly about what you declaim: "bourgeois
| boheme type". If you don't have much money to spend on
| food, you won't be buying it directly from farmers anymore.
| That's sad, and seems weirdly wrong, but that's one of the
| paradoxes of scale in an industrialized, fossil-fuel
| enhanced agricultural system.
| hyperpallium2 wrote:
| survival of the shippest
| rrrrrrrrrrrryan wrote:
| I wonder if there's a market in the U.S. for luxury fruits. I
| always hear about these incredible fruits available abroad
| that are only available in certain seasons, in certain
| climates, that decay quickly and travel poorly.
|
| Presumably, you could grow god-tier mangoes year-round, right
| in the city, by simulating the right climate in fancy
| greenhouses - if you did it right, you wouldn't have an
| electric bill. If the mangoes really are as great as I've
| heard them described, I can imagine people would pay a huge
| premium for them. You could sell them to fancy restaurants,
| make ultra-luxury fruit baskets (I understand these are a big
| deal for Asians & Asian Americans), and eventually scale up
| to selling them to upscale grocery stores.
| Alex3917 wrote:
| > I wonder if there's a market in the U.S. for luxury
| fruits
|
| As a hobbyist rare fruit grower and someone who spends a
| lot of time watching rare fruit YouTube, I would say that
| even though all the ingredients are there, it would be a
| huge uphill battle.
|
| First, let me say the amount of hype right now around rare
| fruit is completely insane. It's literally hundreds of
| times harder to get the top fruit cultivars than it is to
| get a new nike drop, a PS5, etc. Often they only go on sale
| one day a year and are completely sold out in less than a
| minute.
|
| The problem though is that to build a business you need
| repeat customers. There aren't many people willing to pay
| $20+ for some weird looking fruit they've never heard of,
| let alone do this on a weekly basis. Similarly, there
| aren't many people willing to pay $20+ for a single apple
| on a regular basis, when they can buy apples at the store
| for less than a dollar.
|
| As it currently stands, most of the people who would be
| interested in this don't have the money to pay for it, and
| most of the people with the money to pay for it aren't
| interested. I think YouTube has the potential to change
| this, but it clearly hasn't happened yet.
|
| It would be cool to open a story in NYC dedicated entirely
| to rare and luxury fruit, but it would be an insane amount
| of work to market it. And even if you were successful, VCs
| would just give hundreds of millions of dollars to some
| Adam Neumann type who would put you out of business by
| selling the same things at a massive loss.
| wyclif wrote:
| There is, check out Harry & David:
| https://www.harryanddavid.com/h/fruit-gift
| agar wrote:
| We've received Harry & David gifts in the past and - if
| you're expecting exotic fruits - you'll be very
| disappointed. The presentation is beautiful, but getting
| 5 under-ripe pears wrapped in gold foil does not seem
| worth the $50 (including shipping) cost.
|
| Most of their fruit really seems just slightly above
| grocery store quality (though I do live in California, so
| our fruit is good). The varieties may sound special, but
| they're often just a branded version of a common citrus,
| apple, or pear.
| gumby wrote:
| The margin on fruit and vegetable is typically low so you'd
| need quite a high margin, small volume plan. Might be
| doable.
|
| Also: people in climate A don't really know how to eat
| something from climate B ("how to" meaning recipes, is this
| dessert or a staple, etc) so you'd end up with a small
| customer base. Not a bad thing for a small lifestyle
| business in a big city.
| walrus01 wrote:
| Perhaps you could grow some of these (at a very high price)
| in similar facilities that are used for the famous Japanese
| cube/square shaped watermelons that are given as gifts.
|
| https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d&q=cube+s
| h...
|
| If not a market in the USA, maybe in the very luxury food
| segment in Japan and South Korea, in whatever sort of food
| retailers occupy the market niche that is even more
| expensive than Whole Foods.
| brewdad wrote:
| I think there really is a market for special fruits but the
| problems that prevent them from being ubiquitous lead to
| them being extremely local. In my area, we have a specific
| type of strawberry that sells out as quickly as they can be
| harvested. They are unlike any other strawberry available.
| Super juicy and sweet. Bright red throughout. Extremely
| perishable and delicate. They are only available for about
| 3 weeks in June and they tend to get moldy within a few
| days of harvesting, so you really only see them at farmers
| markets and a handful of grocery stores that specialize in
| local produce. If you want the best ones, you need to buy
| them within an hour of the opening of the farmers market.
| By 90 minutes, even the lower quality ones are gone. You
| get 2 more tries the following weekends and then they are
| gone until next year.
|
| Since they cannot travel or be kept in inventory, they will
| never be available fresh more than about 50 miles from
| where they are grown.
| kubafu wrote:
| And do you know what's the variety? Also asking for a
| friend!
| ricksunny wrote:
| What is the area with these strawberries? Asking for a
| friend..
| brewdad wrote:
| Hood strawberries grown in the Willamette Valley of
| Oregon.
| rrrrrrrrrrrryan wrote:
| God, I had a mixed berry smoothie at a random spot in
| Eugene over a decade ago, and it blew my brain right out
| the back of my skull.
|
| Oregon's berries are no joke.
| derefr wrote:
| There are organizations like https://crfg.org/ that grow
| exotic fruits that grocers don't bother to stock. They
| don't sell them (not enough money in it), but I know
| they'll at least provide you with some if you're doing an
| educational thing.
|
| There are also a few businesses following exactly the model
| you outline, but they focus on one varietal/cultivar of one
| fruit, since each requires its own CapEx for its own
| climate setup.
|
| The host of the YouTube channel
| https://m.youtube.com/c/WeirdExplorer gets fruits in from
| both of these all the time, (when he's not going directly
| to other countries just to try exotic fruits.)
| binarynate wrote:
| There's a tasty fruit native to the midwest US called pawpaw
| (aka Indiana banana) that's like a mix between a banana and a
| mango:
|
| https://www.seriouseats.com/what-are-pawpaws-wild-fruit-
| midw...
| cepher wrote:
| Kind of reminds me of the atemoya
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atemoya. Saw it for the
| first time visiting South America, and it reminded me of a
| mix between a banana and something citrus. One of the best
| fruits I've ever tasted.
| Grazester wrote:
| This is what looking at that fruit's flesh reminds me of.
| In the Caribbean it's called Sugar Apple. There is a tree
| outside my bedroom window at my parents house. As a teen
| during the fruit's season I would get tired of the Carib
| Grackles singing up a storm(if you could even call that
| cacophony singing) first thing in the morning eating the
| ripened fruit.
|
| There is also similar one that we call Custard Apple.
| Different islands may have different names for these
| fruits.
| jacquesm wrote:
| First time I went below the equator and saw a local fruit stand
| I didn't recognize half the produce on sale. It took me a while
| to realize that not only does everything taste so much better,
| the same items that would easily fit in the palm of your hand
| when bought as exported would comfortably feed a family of
| four. So I just didn't recognize a lot of the stuff even if I
| knew them already.
| awb wrote:
| I've never had an Egyptian mango so I can't compare but mangoes
| grow quite well in Hawaii and taste great to me.
| omginternets wrote:
| I have a longtime friend whose uncle is from Burkina Faso, who
| insists -- quite emphatically, and with a lot of hand gestures
| -- that mangoes are "The King of Fruits".
|
| Someday, I hope to taste a real mango.
| iSnow wrote:
| Hey, wait. Egypt is just around the corner from Europe.
|
| Why don't we get good mangos? The only good ones cost around 7
| EUR per fruit and are flown in from the tropics.
| wara23arish wrote:
| I grew up close to you and have found the same thing about
| strawberries.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| Ever since I ate mangos in India during mango season (I was
| there in May/June), I have not been able to enjoy a mango in
| the US. Especially this variety:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gir_Kesar
|
| I feel like I should be able to smell it from across the room,
| and there should be no fibers. I have had really good mangos in
| Kenya/Zimbabwe/Zambia too though.
| akudha wrote:
| As a general rule, fruits and vegetables don't taste good in
| the U.S, compared to countries like India. They last much
| longer here though.
|
| I don't know the reason, but I can speculate - too many
| chemicals probably? Every time I am in India, I pig out. Yet,
| I rarely put on weight. I eat way less (like 50% less) in the
| U.S, and put on weight easily unless I am super careful.
|
| This is not to say all foods are awesome in India of course.
| But there is something not right about the quality of food
| here. Everything seems to be optimized for shelf life,
| profit, looks and taste, rather than nutrition.
|
| A single mango in my town costs $2.79, it has zero smell and
| tastes like cardboard. But it doesn't go bad even after ten
| days, on the kitchen counter (I mean, outside the
| refrigerator).
| perfectstorm wrote:
| I'm glad i'm not the only person who noticed the weight
| gain aspect and i have similar stories. I would eat three
| full meals a day whenever I go to India but I rarely gain
| any weight. I can't imagine what sort of weight gain I
| would get if i eat three similar meals here in the U.S.
|
| When it's mango season in India you could smell from nearby
| areas (with right wind conditions). The mangoes you get at
| grocery stores in US has no smell and oftentimes taste
| plain/lifeless.
| SamBam wrote:
| The main difference is fruits and vegetables in the US are
| bred for storage and transport, and not for flavor.
|
| This is starting to swing back, with people appreciating
| flavor, but this will require people to accept that there
| are seasons to fruits and vegetables, which is hard when
| you're used to year-round supply. But if you want a tomato
| in January or an apple in June, those just aren't going to
| taste as good.
| Ozzie_osman wrote:
| > The main difference is fruits and vegetables in the US
| are bred for storage and transport, and not for flavor.
|
| And probably for sales/cosmetics. Eg most people would
| agree Red Delicious apples are far from being the
| tastiest, but they have a very appealing name and look
| great.
| culi wrote:
| > The main difference is fruits and vegetables in the US
| are bred for storage and transport, and not for flavor.
|
| I've heard this take a lot, but I really think it has a
| lot more to do with how we treat our soils. American
| agriculture is obsessed with sterile soils. But the
| MAJORITY of plants in the wild get the MAJORITY of their
| nutrients from mycorrhizal fungi. Something which is not
| present in sterilized soil.
|
| They are quite fragile too. Not only are they killed by
| pesticides/fungicides, but even artificial fertilizers
| hurt them because plants rely on lack of phosphorus for
| them to start the signaling process to hook up with the
| fungi. Artificial phosphorus is much less bioavailable to
| plants, but its presence is enough to make them not start
| that complicated chemical dance
|
| The mineral content of our vegetables has declined by
| over 90% since 1914.[0] I'd find it hard to believe this
| lack of nutrient doesn't also have a massive impact on
| flavor profiles
|
| [0] https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/soil-
| depletion-an...
| edge17 wrote:
| For mangos the varieties that dominate in the US are the
| ones grown by the mexican and south american producers.
| They actively lobby to keep out other producer, and they
| can't just change what they grow overnight (nor does it
| benefit them since they already control the US market).
|
| US food inspectors are required in places like India and
| Asia, but if enough inspectors aren't hired then you
| can't expect the exports to grow in a meaningful way. As
| you can imagine incumbent mango producers in the US don't
| want more inspectors in these countries. It's basically a
| cartel.
| akudha wrote:
| I get your point about seasonality, but most produce here
| don't taste good _any time_ of the year, even when
| they're supposed to be in season.
|
| I have heard the same feedback from others too, I am not
| the only one.
|
| Someone told me the same chocolates taste better outside
| U.S, because corn syrup is used in the American version.
| jitendrac wrote:
| That's my favorite, And our family eats them in season every
| year. To get the real test of the kesar mangoes, you must get
| them when they are still green, and ripe them at home.
| newhotelowner wrote:
| Go to Toronto during first week of May. Ask for Gujarati
| Indian grocery store. They should have Indian kesar.
|
| There is this store owner who also owns farms in India. They
| grow mangoes just for Canada.
|
| While you are there, try different mangos likes Desi, Langda,
| Hafus & Rajapuri.
| hedora wrote:
| Do any of these varieties grow in the SF bay area, or is it
| too cold in the winter?
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| No, I do not think it is anywhere near hot/humid enough in
| CA for mangos. I have a family member that started a farm
| for them (not the Kesar variety) in South Florida that have
| tasted okay, so maybe FL is an option.
| newhotelowner wrote:
| Too cold weather.
| u801e wrote:
| > I moved to the US, and I haven't had a good mango here.
|
| I'm used to the chaunsa variety, but I've found that alphonso
| mangos are a good substitute and are not too difficult to find
| in the US. I don't know how those varieties compare to the ones
| commonly found in Egypt.
| [deleted]
| iamarunr wrote:
| In South India, our parents would make us take our shirts off
| before we eat mangoes to avoid getting stains as well. I was
| stuck in India due to the pandemic and got so lucky to be stuck
| during the mango season. Bliss!
| atulatul wrote:
| Probably tropical weather is needed. In mango season (March-
| July), I feel blessed to be in India. Many varieties, my
| favorite being Alphonso:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alphonso_(mango)
| Ozzie_osman wrote:
| We have Alphonso in Egypt, too! Though I prefer Eweis which
| is much sweeter.
|
| I've heard most of the mango strains in Egypt originated in
| India and spread there during British rule.
| moeris wrote:
| In fact, we have Alphonso mangoes in the US on a seasonal
| basis. Add others have pointed out, they're likely not as
| good due to shipping constraints.
| wyclif wrote:
| One of the best places in the world for high quality mangoes is
| the island of Guimaras in the Philippines. They have a mangoe
| festival every May. They are considered to be the sweetest
| world-class mangoes, but I don't think any of them make it to
| the US because they're difficult to ship.
| mariusmg wrote:
| Very cool, way better than JS frameworks comparations :)
| system2 wrote:
| Or super basic CSS tutorials somehow for unknown reasons get
| very popular here.
| enraged_camel wrote:
| How much light is needed to grow seeds like this, during the
| first year? Direct sunlight, or is ambient indoor lighting
| sufficient?
| andrew_ wrote:
| For growing mango from seed, or really anything from seed, you
| cannot beat a small plastic container (like what cottage cheese,
| sour cream, or green yogurt might come in) filled halfway with
| coconut coir. It's absolutely the best medium for germinating
| seed. Fill halfway with coir and water once a week. Coconut coir
| keeps water evenly distributed and I've never had a seed or
| seedling mold over using it.
|
| I personally use 2 lb greek yogurt (or soup, as in from Costco)
| containers because the extra height also lets me keep the seed in
| there longer and develop initial root structure. That's
| incredibly helpful for transferring to pots, and a little coconut
| coir in the soul doesn't hurt.
| cronix wrote:
| I prefer heavy duty felt pots which have the advantage of "air
| pruning" the roots. Once you've seen the root system those
| develop you won't go back to anything plastic. Instead of just
| curling around the bottom of the container in search of the air
| holes at the bottom, the roots grow just to the pot walls and
| stop, because they get plenty of oxygen transferred through the
| felt so they don't continue on searching for it becoming root-
| bound - in all directions. One solid massive root ball. One
| brand name is "smart pots." They're reusable as well.
|
| Edit: Hard to find a video that don't involve cannabis growing,
| but here's a decent one:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4GrnTSXsFKI
| tyjaksn wrote:
| A burlap sack would probably work in a similar manner, but
| not sure how long it would last.
| andrew_ wrote:
| I bet the coir + felt pot would combine for some outstanding
| growth
| pimlottc wrote:
| Coconut coir is also known as coconut fibre; it's the springy
| material you get from inside the shell when you husk a coconut.
| I had never heard the term before and had to look it up.
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coir
| InvaderFizz wrote:
| I wonder if this is the reason the GP has such luck with it.
| From the linked Wikipedia article:
|
| > Trichoderma is a naturally occurring fungus in coco peat;
| it works in symbiosis with plant roots to protect them from
| pathogenic fungi such as Pythium. It is not present in
| sterilised coco peat[citation needed].
| barathr wrote:
| I've found that if you don't transplant out of such containers
| very early, the root system is stunted. Instead, you can take
| two cardboard 1/2 gallon milk containers, cut the bottom off of
| one and stack them to make a tall tube pot. Fruit tree
| seedlings can survive in that kind of pot for 6 months to a
| year and then can be planted in the ground without disturbing
| the roots (you just dig the hole, cut the bottom of the bottom
| cardboard container and place in the hole, fill the hole with
| dirt, and pull the cardboard container off like a sleeve).
| andrew_ wrote:
| that's a great idea. The same cab probably be done with two
| plastic containers, with large holes in the bottom, cutting
| away the bottom for the roots. I like to reuse those
| containers whenever possible, especially since recycling in
| my area is pretty much ceremonial. I find that if you
| transplant out of the taller container by the time the shoots
| reach the lid, you're in good shape for the roots to take to
| a pot.
| mongol wrote:
| I use gravel.
| culi wrote:
| Peat moss is a good alternative as well and has most of the
| same properties you pointed out
| andrew_ wrote:
| from what I understand, it doesn't have the same anti-
| pathogen properties as coir.
| [deleted]
| Fiahil wrote:
| My experience is very different !
|
| Coconut coir is a real pain and struggle to remove and separate
| from the roots when you need a transplant.
|
| Likewise small plastic containers are way too small for growing
| trees especially from large and medium seeds like nuts or
| mangoes.
|
| Ideally, you want to pick a really big one (at least 5 to 8
| liters) with a preference for depth over width, to grant the
| tree more space to grow and not damage the roots. They are
| quite sensitive in the first year, and each transplant will
| slow the growth for 1 to 3 weeks.
|
| Growth is driven by two things : environment
| (sun/water/temperature) and soil. The one you find in most
| gardening shops is fine, as long as it's not too heavy and
| doesn't contain peat (might be difficult for our North American
| friends). I switched to fine, light soil with mycorrhizae and
| wood fiber, with a greater success.
|
| Fertilizer is completely optional in the first year, but if you
| add some, avoid putting it in contact with the roots.
|
| Finally, trees grow stronger if they are kept without support
| under the assault of the rain, wind and sun. They are meant to
| resist and adapt to their environment, so you really don't need
| to add a prop to keep them straight.
|
| This year, I'm testing different style of pruning. My intuition
| tells me that no-to-very-light pruning yields better
| development than the fast and heavy pruning you see in
| gardening shops.
|
| PS: I've grown 30 trees from seeds on my small balcony.
| hackerlytest wrote:
| I love mangoes.
|
| Anyway testing multi line text reply for my upcoming HN app.
|
| Please ignore.
|
| Last line
| carapace wrote:
| I've been growing plants for the last year and a half or so
| (covid y'know) and it's really enjoyable and fulfilling, I highly
| recommend it.
|
| Among other things I've got five little macadamia trees, three
| Torrey pine trees, two carob trees that just sprouted, and a
| sequoiadendron giganteum seedling about an inch tall. (It's funny
| to me that the Giant Sequoia seeds are tiny, smaller than a grain
| of rice, yet the tree grows to be so huge.)
|
| It's fun and fascinating to watch them sprout and grow.
|
| (FWIW, I really like J.L. Hudson for seeds:
| https://jlhudsonseeds.net/index.html They have all kinds of
| plants from all over the world, really good prices and quality,
| and I like their attitude.)
| ornornor wrote:
| I find it incredibly frustrating.
|
| Some plants will die right away so at least it's a fast
| failure.
|
| But others will be ok for quite a while, several months or even
| a year or two. And then they'll start yellowing, losing leaves,
| whatever, and eventually die.
|
| Even plants that are supposedly hardy, like ivy.
|
| I absolutely hate growing plants, and it actually makes me
| angry to see them fail. Even though I love an interior with
| plants, I'm actually feeling better if I never tried to have
| the plant than if I did and it inevitably dies.
|
| Luckily, I live in nature and can open the windows instead, my
| surroundings being a forest.
| carapace wrote:
| I'm not an expert but to me this suggests at least two
| possibilities:
|
| 1) Were you feeding them at all? Maybe they were just running
| out of nutrients.
|
| 2) Something environmental in your area, bad water or radon
| or something.
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