Tamarind

[Lickey]

We just had our 2nd and final picking of Tamarind, 60 trees and 30k bht, so not so bad, the last time they were fertilised was 3 years ago, they are 18 years old and have just had a good pruning, the branches are left near the base of the tree and once the green dies of the wood will be dragged out and sold for charcoal purposes, Now the man who bought and supplied the labour for picking told us that when the tree starts making new flowers, add 1 ltr of carnation [cream] milk to 200 ltrs of water and spray trees, I can only think this would be to atract bees for polination, any ideas? Thanks Lickey..

[fruity]

Lickey, as a matter of interest, what does the average tree yield in weight? In Buriram just now, the annual city fair is running,as always there must be 30-plus Tamarind sellers, each with mountains of them, sorted into sizes. The very big ones being the most expensive @ 60 baht per kilo. Sorry can't help re the Carnation, however, this rings a distant bell, just can't remember what:)

[slapout]

Lickey; My wife tried the milk on lamyai 2 years ago, same mixture, different tree expert. The crop was the worst we have had in 5 years, kilo wise. Bees seem to go for blooms without any stimulant being applied. I asked what the purpose of the milk mixture was, but never really got a specific answer, only it helps set fruit. She applied this mixture 2 times during bloom. Until someone can give me a bonified reason for this, I will pass on future use. I suspect it may have contributed to bloom drop, but this is just a guess on my part. If someone knows different, I would also like to hear about it, as well as results.

[Lickey]

Hi Fruity and Slapout, thanks for your replies, The trees were at their best after the fertilizer, each of the trees yeilded approx 50kilos per picking, 2 pickings total, near 6000ks, Mrs employed labour to do this, and it took near a week a time, so that knocked a hole in the profit,,, anyway, this year, she got a buyer to come/look, he said 15000bht per picking times 2, he supplied the labour, about 20/25 people, dindt have to buy them food or drink ect, buyer done this, anyway, it looks like this years crop was down to about 35ks per tree per picking, about 428bht per tree, which equtates to 2100bht for the seller at best price,

Moving on to the carnation milk spray, the mrs phoned buyer today and asked him to elaborate on this,he told her it is to help fruit set, although our 40 rai farm is hillside, it never really suffers from high winds, which i think could be a major cause of fruit un-set, so after reading slapouts post, not going to bother with this!! instead, will dig the trench around the tree, but in fertilizer,cover back with earth and water in, try to get back to 50ks per tree for next season, Cheers, Lickey..