Can you pick them now and let them ripen off the tree?

And it might be roof rats biting your fruit - bait or traps can help.

These work to a certain extent till they figure out they can chew through them! But it does slow them down. I also use a small strip of duct tape on the opening too so when the clamshell falls it usually doesn't snap open. This works of course if your mangoes are low enough to reach with a small ladder :o)...I have a TON of squirrels, raccoons, rabbits and opposum that eat about 50% of them or worse... but with these, I can at least eat almost half of the fruits of my hard labor! I do check on them several times a day, as I find closed clamshells that fall on the ground which usually means they are either ripe or ripe enough to finish ripening in the house...you can pick them "mature green" and finish ripening them inside. I wrap them in newspaper put them on card board box, place a ripe apple or banana inside the box and they will ripen any where from 2-10 days...Check them daily, some ripen faster than others...Good luck!!

As you can see most of my fruits are very low hanging, several are up high, those I cannot use the produce clamshells Lol...

Just rained here so they are wet...they are vented which helps a lot...

For fruits that are out of racoon reach.

What are those? Plastic deli containers? I can't tell what you are using.

Thanks,

Jane

Hi Jane, Yes, they are produce clamshells, they go by several names, the ones I use usually are the ones that 1 pound size of strawberries that come in, I ordered a case of them online because I have several mango trees and I still ran out, but as I pick the ones that ripen, I just cover up the next batch...

Four, are you using netting with a wire or are those made from window screen? I have used window screen before but the are a lot of work to make...

Synthetic cloth mesh bags with drawstrings. Yeah, I knew not to mess with wire mesh for bags. I made wire frames to retain the volume for other use (caterpillars - chyrsaloids - eclosions); frame irrelevant in mango application.

I also will use the following, which is for laundering a brassiere, to hold mangos

(No, I did not say that a brassiere holds mangos.)

Lol...I do use those mesh laundry bags you posted for delicates and works great. Good idea for using them for mangoes though they can get pricey if you need a lot ;o) at this point whatever works I say! I have also used window screens, cut them up and sewn them to make bags... but they do chew them up eventually **sigh**

From years past...

Chew-proof

It is a wastepaper basket.

>"window screens... they do chew them up" ___ Probably not squirrels?

I love it!! That's a great idea for a pineapple! Looks ready to pick, enjoy!!

I cut my last two mango trees down last year because of two problems. My 20 yr old Glenn was getting too tall,..well over 23, 24 ft,..not easy, even standing on a ladder with my telescoping fruit picker. Second, and worse by far problem was the red necked birds that suddenly descended on my trees and devastated 40 to 50 % of my hanging fruit. The 1/4 chewed mangoes just fell to the ground.

So I called in a contractor and had both the Glenn and the Kent cut down. Then I went out and bought a dwarf Pickering mango tree and planted it. It will grow to a max height of 10- 11 feet,..so will be easy to maintain. The flesh is not stringy and has a mouthwatering coconut/mango taste. In the ground only 9 months and I have one huge fruit that will be processed by me soon....NOT the birds. Had NO IDEA I'd get one eatable mango this soon.

The darn tree is only THREE FEET TALL !!! NEXT year, IN JUNE/JULY I SHOULD HAVE A DOZEN OR MORE . THE KILLER BIRDS WILL NOT BE A FACTOR,...NETTING WILL BE USED AND IF ONE GETS BY THE NETTING i'LL STRANGLE THE THIEF !

THE FRUIT IS SCRUMPTIOUS ! AND, you WILL still have enough to give away to those special friends & bartenders, so you'll still be king of the hill !.

Also, as you get older like me, it'll be a piece of cake to manage & harvest these two small trees !

You did good.

Tree removal as a solution; you get extra points for that one!

Please tell us where to get some of your racoon-proof nets.

Your sardonic sense of humor is hilarious. Have never seen a racoon hereabouts in the 17 yrs I've lived here, so not a problem for me.

Hi Jofus...I truly understand what you said, I get it!! I LOVE Pickering mango, sadly, I had to remove mine **sigh** due to it being too close to the location we were building a screened it porch and the tree was smack dab in the way, it was very sad to see it go but had no choice. I have no more room for another tree but if I have to replace one of my trees, it will be a Pickering!

Here's my 3 year old Pickering many years ago, still crying when I see this picture!

You can see how it was in the way of where we built the screened it porch!

My Pickering summer of 2012, planted it about 5 months earlier.

My Pickering in October of 2014...grew very fast for a dwarf Lol...

I trimmed it back in Oct and this one was taken the following winter (Feb-March) 2015

Great story Pug, am so sorry you had to loose your Pickering. I too was blown away by how fast that little tree grew.

The one mango I have hanging ( will have to take a pic someday soon ) is a total surprise, - just figured the first year would not produce even one fully developed and ripe fruit. I must now try to come up with something to protect that lonely guy,..it's sitting only 6 inches from the ground ! Talk about low hanging fruit !

Just found an empty plastic bag with a sealing strip across the top, went out and fitted it on the lonely guy,..but think I may have to figure out another enclosure. Am thinking the critters just haven't discovered this guy yet,...however, figure I'll be picking it in another 10 days or so,..so right now just not sure what to do.

Good luck! I do hope you get to enjoy that mango, Pickering is a very prolific tree so that's a plus! I've seen pictures of people using a 2 liter soda or water bottle, cutting the top off and placing the fruit inside and tying it to a branch since you only have one to protect :o)

Jofus, plastc bag to discourage birds?

Thanks pug, as I said earlier I was unsure how to proceed due to the fact I'll be harvesting that big mango soon. I did already remove the plastic bag and replaced it with the bottom of an empty plastic milk container that I was getting ready to throw out. Looks fine,.hopefully it'll hold up for another week. Hopefully next year I'll have HALF the little sprouting green guys that were in your photo. :o)

Well, I finally got around to a permanent resolution re my only mango, hanging naked on my Pickering tree, only protected by 1/2 an empty, old plastic milk carton only 6 inches from the ground.

Watching a couple of adult rabbits hobble by as I trimmed my Muskogee crepe myrtle tree early this morning, I realized that either of those big guys I saw could should be able to tear off the cover I installed. Walking out there one morning and seeing that lonely, pampered mango laying in the grass half eaten, was just too much to contemplate.

I decided to finalize it the old fashioned way, simply pick it, wrap it in an old newspaper and leave it on the kitchen counter,...should ripen in one day,..two at the most.

I just knew I was hanging onto that 1951 edition of the New York Daily News for a reason. :o)

I did not know about the newspaper method before reading this thread. Would on-tree remaining ripening time likewise have been one or two days? Longer? Shorter?

Unfortunately the " newspaper wrap " would not work on a tree,... simply a last gasp effort to ripen an almost ripe fruit.

How much more on-tree (sans paper) ripening time was needed at the time that you harvested it?

This is my very first Pickering. The stats say fruit ripens June, July.

puglvr, I have one question for you, After you planted your first PICKERING, HOW LONGdid you have to wait for ededible fruit to pick, --was it one fruit or many ?

Hi Jofus, it bloomed and had tiny mangoes the following year...I think I let it hold 2 of the largest baby fruits for the first year and then the second year maybe 6 made it to maturity? I did give that tree a ton of TLC, I fertilized it monthly and gave it some fish emulsion for the first year after planting, plus with all the rain in the summer it just took off really quickly.

Hi, it's a battle, isn't it? I use the strawberry container clam shells as well. It seems to work for most things. However, this year I haven't put any one and haven't lost a single fruit. The first thing you have to do is identify the culprits. I had a couple large male raccoons and some possums in previous year, so I bought one of those have-a-heart traps and baited it with a marshmallow smeared with a bit of peanut butter. I caught them in a single day and then relocated them ten miles away from my home. Pretty easy. I then set rat bait in rat bait traps in a couple areas of my property. The last problem was the squirrels! I never minded them too much, but I discovered that they were the cause of my internet going out since they chew on the cables plus they have the habit of taking a bite out of my fruit (a peach or a mango usually or maybe a starfruit) then leaving it to take another bite out of another fruit; at least the raccoon devoured only a single fruit in a sitting. A squirrel will go through five. To solve this prolbem (don't judge me too harshly), but I purchased this -- https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B00K6JKVLS/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1. It traps and kills the squirrels pretty easily. I then use them for fertilizer for the trees that they were using to ruin my fruit. The end result is I'm not spending my time wrapping each fruit in a clamshell anymore.

Just to update. I wound up picking any I could reach and they were all hard and green. I did let them ripen on the countertop and they were so delicious.

The rest were up to high for me to reach and most were pulled off by critters and on the ground. Many were eaten while still hanging. Strangely, shaved by something. Very weird how it almost looked like razor blades scraped the fruit. A neighbor told me it looked like fruit bats, but I have no idea.

Such a shame as there had to be more than a hundred mangos on the tree. I got 4 which we enjoyed very much.

I don't know the name of the tree, but the fruit is very large, almost like a cantaloupe. As they ripen they turn yellow. But, the fruit shape is round like a melon. Very sweet and creamy, just delicious.

I'm thinking of having a tree service pruning the tree and lowering the top. It is getting way too tall. I had it pruned a few years ago and had the top taken off which made it grow even wider. It is a very large tree. But the few fruit I'm able to get are so delicious.

Thanks for all the hints. I think I'd need a bucket truck to reach most of the fruit!

Jane

>"need a bucket truck to reach most of the fruit" ___ No, a long pole.

>"looked like razor blades scraped the fruit" ___ A large amount of each removed?