Rumani Mango

For the first four years after planting the mango seedlings, I grew a variety of intercrops such as vegetables and groundnuts to supplement income.

After harvest the intercrops were ploughed into the soil as green manure," he said. The fruits were plucked only from the fifth year. He had procured the grafts from a local farm and had planted them at a spacing of about 6 feet in straight lines.
Before planting, the land was ploughed well by mixing rotten farmyard manure.
About 3 cubic m pits were dug and three-fourth of each pit was filled with about 20 kg of farmyard manure.
The mango seedlings were planted in a way that the grafted portion was above the soil surface and the pits were closed with sand and irrigated.The trees were regularly manured during August-September every year with liberal quantities of well rotten farmyard manure and neem cake.
Other common practices required for mangoes such as pruning the shoots below the grafted portion, weeding and ploughing the interspaces were also done.
For the first 3-4 years the trees were not allowed to flower and if flowering was noticed it was removed manually, Mr. Veerabhadran explained.
To protect the trees from pests such as fruit fly and fruit borer, the farmer adopted an indigenous plant protection method.
A paste made from the leaves of Neem, Adathoda, Pungai, Nochi, and Perandai (Tamil names) was soaked in cow's urine for 15-20 days.
After 15 days the solution was filtered and then diluted in water (1ml of the paste in 10 ml of water) and sprayed over the crown of the trees.