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Magnoliopsida
Mangifera indica L.
EOL Text
The common mango has been cultivated for thousands of years and now has a pantropical distribution. Wild populations can be found in Assam, India and Myanmar, especially the Assam-Chittagong Hills.
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Mangifera indica is among the most economically and culturally important tropical fruits, especially in Asia. It was originally found in the foothills of the Himalayas in northeastern India, Burma, and Bangladesh and domesticated thousands of years ago (possibly independently in Southeast Asia). It is now grown in most tropical countries and some subtropical ones (it is grown as far north as 35° to 37° N in southern Spain). Many cultivars in India have been vegetatively propagated for hundreds of years. Early on, hundreds of years ago, mango was brought to Malaysia and other East Asian countries, then to East and West Africa, and finally to the New World. The Portugese introduced the mango to Brazil from their colonies in Mozambique and Angola and mangos were introduced to Mexico and Panama via the Philippines. Mangos were introduced to the West Indies in the mid-to late 1700s, probably via Brazil. In the tropics, mangos grow at elevations up to 1200 m. The trees may reach 40 m or more in height and live for several hundred years. They bear rosettes of evergreen leaves (red or yellow at first) and dense panicles up to 30 cm long of small (5 to 10 mm) reddish or yellowish flowers. The fruits, which range from 2.5 cm to more than 30 cm in length, depending on the cultivar, vary in shape (from round to oval, egg-shaped, or kidney-shaped) and color (green, yellow, red, purple) with a dotted skin. (Vaughan and Geissler 1997; Bompard 2009 and references therein; Mukherjee and Litz 2009 and references therein) A single mature mango tree can produce 2000 to 2500 ripe fruits (Jiron and Headström 1985).
India has long been a major mango producer, but as of 2009 China had risen to become the world's second largest mango producer, with India's production representing less than half the world total. Fresh mangos are now available in stores year-round in North America, Europe, and Japan. (Litz 2009) According to Evans and Mendoza (2009), the majority of the mangos imported by North America come from Mexico, Brazil, Peru, Ecuador, and Haiti. India and Pakistan are the main suppliers of western Asia. Southeast Asia is supplied mainly by the Philippines and Thailand. Europe imports mangos mainly from South America and Asia. India and Mexico each account for roughly a fifth to a quarter of world mango exports. World mango imports more than doubled between 1996 and 2005, with the United States accounting for a third of all mango imports.
The peel of the fruit and other parts of the mango can cause contact dermatitis in some people, as is the case for many species in the plant family Anacardiaceae.
The many contributors to Litz (2009) provide a comprehensive overview of mango biology and cultivation.
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Rights holder/Author | Shapiro, Leo, Shapiro, Leo, EOL Rapid Response Team |
Source | http://eolspecies.lifedesks.org/pages/70763 |
General: The cashew family (Anacardiaceae), of which mango is a member, includes a number of species which can cause severe skin irritation in humans. Poison ivy (Rhus toxicodendron), found in North America, is one particularly notable example. For most people, mango has no such effect, but in sensitive individuals ingestion of the fruit, or skin contact with its juice, may cause a poison ivy-like rash.
Mango is a large evergreen tree that can reach 15 to 30 m tall. They are fast growing erect trees with slender to broad and rounded upright canopy that can be used for landscape and shade. The trees are long -lived with some still producing fruit at 300 years old. The tree is anchored by a long unbranched taproot can descend to a depth of 6-8 m plus a mass of feeder roots. The feeder roots send down anchor roots which penetrate the soil to a depth of 1.2 m and spread lateral as far as 7.5 m.
The leaves are alternate, simple, leathery, oblong-lanceolate, 29-30 cm long X 3-5 cm wide on flowering branches, up to 50 cm on sterile branches. The young leaves are red, aging to shiny dark green above, lighter below, with yellow or white venation.
The inflorescence is a much-branched panicle bearing many very small (4 mm) greenish white or pinkish flowers. Both male and bisexual flowers are borne on the same tree. The flowers are radially symmetrical, and usually have 5 petals, streaked with red. There is usually only 1 fertile stamen per flower; the 4 other stamens are sterile. The flower has a conspicuous 5-lobed disk between the petals and stamens.
The fruit is an irregularly egg-shaped and slightly compressed fleshy drupe, 8-12 (-30) cm long, attached at the broadest end on a pendulous stalk. The skin is smooth greenish-yellow, sometimes tinged with red. The underlying yellow-orange flesh varies in quality from soft, sweet, juicy and fiber-free in high-quality selected (clonal) varieties to turpentine-flavored and fibrous in unselected (wild) seedlings. The single, compressed-ovoid seed is encased in the white fibrous inner layer of the fruit.
Mangoes can be round, oval, heart-shaped, or kidney-shaped; and can weigh as little as a few ounces or as much as five pounds. Their highly aromatic flesh surrounds a very large inedible flat seed. At its best, it has a pleasant resinous quality, but at its worst can smell like kerosene. The soft pulp is juicy and sweet, although it can sometimes has an acid overtone. Some mangoes have fibrous flesh, while others are buttery all the way through.
The round or oval fruit is somewhat flattened and can weigh up to 0.5 kg. The flesh of good fruit has a pleasant aromatic flavor, but inferior varieties have a turpentine flavor and can be rather fibrous. In the centre is the large fibrous flat seed containing a kernel.
Distribution and Habitat: The mango is native to southern Asia, especially Burma and eastern India. It spread early on to Malaya, eastern Asia and eastern Africa.
Mangoes are grown throughout the tropics, from the Caribbean to Africa, South-East Asia, Australia, as well as India, where the history of the fruit goes back over 6,000 years and closely connected to the Hindu religion. As long ago as the 16th century, mangoes had been distributed via cultivation throughout the Indian subcontinent, and eventually to all tropical regions of the world.
It performs best at elevations from 0-1200 m. with a pronounced rainy season for vegetative growth, a dry season for flowering and fruiting, and on well-drained soils ranging in pH between 5.5 to 7.5. It was not until the 19th century that traders introduced the fruit to the West Indies, Africa, South America, Mexico, Florida, and Hawaii. Mangoes were introduced to California (Santa Barbara) in 1880.
For current distribution, please consult the Plant Profile page for this species on the PLANTS Web site.
Medium to large tree. Leaves alternate, simple, glabrous, oblong-lanceolate with prominent midrib. Inflorescence a panicle with male and female flowers in the same infl; axis reddish, shortly hairy. Flowers greenish-cream with reddish veins. Fruit a large fleshy drupe, variable in shape and size, yellow to red when ripe.
"Mangifera indica is a large erect evergreen tree, with a dark green, umbrella-shaped canopy which may, with age, attain 100 to 125 ft (30-38 m) in width, or a more upright, oval, relatively slender crown. In deep soil, the taproot descends to a depth of 20 ft (6 in), the profuse, wide-spreading, feeder root system also sends down many anchor roots which penetrate for several feet. Trunk stout, 90 cm in diameter; bark brown, smoothish, with many thin fissures; thick, becoming darker, rough and scaly or furrowed; branchlets rather stout, pale green and hairless. Inner bark light brown and bitter. A whitish latex exudes from cut twigs and a resin from cuts in the trunk. Leaves alternate, simple, leathery, oblong-lanceolate, 16-30 x 3-7 cm, on flowering branches, up to 50 cm on sterile branches, curved upward from the midrib and sometimes with edges a little wavy. Young leaves red, aging to shiny dark green above, lighter below, with pale and conspicous midrib, yellow or white venation; petioles 4.5 cm long, striate and swollen at the base. Full-grown leaves may be 4 to 12.5 in (10-32 cm) long and 3/4 to 2 1/8 in (2-5.4 cm) wide. Inflorescence 16 cm or more in length, a much-branched panicle bearing many very small (4 mm) greenish-white or pinkish flowers. Hundreds and even as many as 3,000 to 4,000 small, yellowish or reddish flowers, 25% to 98% male, the rest hermaphroditic, are borne in profuse, showy, erect, pyramidal, branched clusters 2 1/2 to 15 1/2 in (6-40 cm) high. Flowers radially symmetrical, usually have 5 spreading petals, 3-5 mm long, 1-1.5 mm broad, streaked with red, imbricate, with the median petal prolonged like a crest at the base, finely hairy and fragrant, partly male and partly bisexual; stalk short; 5 stamens, 1 fertile, the other 4 shorter and sterile, borne in a disc. The flower has a conspicuous 5-lobed disc between the petals and stamens. Calyx yellow-green, very short, deeply 5-lobed; 5 sepals, each 2-2.5 mm long x 1-1.5 mm broad, green with whitish margin, or yellowish-green, hairy outside. There is great variation in the form, size, color and quality of the fruits. These drupes may be nearly round, oval, ovoid-oblong, or somewhat kidney-shaped, often with a break at the apex, and are usually more or less lop-sided. They range from 2 1/2 to 10 in (6.25-25 cm) in length and from a few ounces to 4 to 5 lbs (1.8-2.26 kg). The skin is leathery, waxy, smooth, fairly thick, aromatic and ranges from light-or dark-green to clear yellow, yellow-orange, yellow and reddish-pink, or more or less blushed with bright-or dark-red or purple-red, with fine yellow, greenish or reddish dots, and thin or thick whitish, gray or purplish bloom, when fully ripe. Some have a """"turpentine"""" odor and flavor, while others are richly and pleasantly fragrant. The flesh ranges from pale-yellow to deep-orange. It is essentially peach-like but much more fibrous (in some seedlings excessively so-actually """"stringy""""); is extremely juicy, with a flavor range from very sweet to subacid to tart. There is a single, longitudinally ribbed, pale yellowish-white, somewhat woody stone, flattened, oval or kidney-shaped, sometimes rather elongated. It may have along one side a beard of short or long fibers clinging to the flesh cavity, or it may be nearly fiberless and free. Within the stone is the starchy seed, monoembryonic (usually single-sprouting) or polyembryonic (usually producing more than one seedling)."
Cultivated; 200-1400 m.
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Mango fruits are an excellent source of vitamin C and carotenoids and Oliveira et al. (2010) found that the nutrient content of mangos was quite stable during fruit processing in a commercial restaurant.
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Rights holder/Author | Shapiro, Leo, Shapiro, Leo, EOL Rapid Response Team |
Source | http://eolspecies.lifedesks.org/pages/70763 |
indica: of India
Árbol.