Two-year-old mango tree produces huge fruit for home gardener
A QLD gardener suspects his ‘rugby league ball’ sized mango might be one of the largest Bowen mangoes this season. Find out what he did to make the tree so prolific.
Townsville
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When it comes to competitions, there is nothing more quintessentially northern Queensland than the annual hunt for the largest mango of the season.
FNQ home gardener Adam Cerruti never expected he’d be involved in the title fight, but the first crop off his two-year-old Bowen mango tree has been monstrous.
The biggest monster on the tree is a “near 25cm” fruit yet to ripen.
“I’m too afraid to lift it up and weigh it in case it snaps off,” Mr Cerruti said.
“Some of the other fruit are so heavy the branches are leaning over and the fruit is resting on the ground, and I need to lift them so I can mow the lawn.”
Mr Cerruti described his mango tree as “about two years old and only as tall as me”.
Based in Cairn’s northern beaches, Mr Cerruti puts his young tree’s larger-than-life success down to the Cyclone Jasper floods.
“Two years ago it was a little tiny stick. I specifically bought it at the nursery because it was root bound in the pot and I wanted something that wouldn’t grow big. I had just cut down a mango tree, and I bought this one intending to keep it really pruned,” he said.
“I reckon it’s grown like this because of all the nitrogen we’ve had off the sugarcane fields and farms when it flooded.”
Another element might be that the tree only has around 20 mangoes to put its energy into.
“The fruiting happened early, but the tree naturally dropped a lot of fruit when they got to around plum sized and only 20 stayed on,” Mr Cerruti said.
The graphic designer said he’d been up to Mareeba recently and checked out their mango crop, but said the trees up there seemed a little stressed, and suspects his Cairns backyard harvest might have a leg up on the competition.
“I find this very interesting and wanted to put it out there and see if there were any records for the biggest mango,” Mr Cerruti said.
“A Cairns Postjournalist did send me a link to the Guinness World Record mango, but that was one of those stringy mangoes they grow in the Philippines. I want to know about Bowen mangoes.”
The official record Mr Cerruti needs to beat is 4.25kg to claim the Guinness World Record for heaviest mango.
Closer to home, regional newspaper The Mareeba Express also runs an annual mango competition, for Kensington Pride/Bowen mangoes.
In 2022 the Mareeba competition was won by a 2.068kg mango, in 2023 it was a 1.840kg mango, and in 2024 a 1.722kg mango.
Right now, a 1.514kg mango from Sienna and Liam Avolio is leading the 2025 competition. Do you have a bigger mango? Reach out to daneka.hill@news.com.au
Originally published as Two-year-old mango tree produces huge fruit for home gardener
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