My wife was given 3 rai of paddy land. After seeing the amount of hard work required to grow rice, I told my wife that we would convert the land to grow mangoes and cashews.

Her father divided his land between to his sons and daughters. The land given to us is located between her brother and sister. The brothers and sisters live on their land whereas we come on week-ends.

I've have raised (filled the land with soil otherwise it would be under water during the rainy season)  two rai of the land and planted about 35 mango trees and 20 cashew trees. I'm hoping to move out of teaching in about 5 years. Until now, I would say it has been expensive and their is a large learning curve to building an orchard.

I'm hoping each year to plant more trees and increase the yield of the land. It's a slow process, but hopefully it will be sucessful.

How long will it be before the cashew trees bear fruit?

gungchang wrote:How long will it be before the cashew trees bear fruit?

The traditional cashew tree is tall (up to 14 m) and takes three years from planting before it starts production, and eight years before economic harvests can begin. More recent breeds, such as the dwarf cashew trees, are up to 6 m tall, and start producing after the first year, with economic yields after three years.

The wife's sister lives next and she has 2 cashew trees about 6m to 7m. I don't know the age of the trees, but this is where we got our cashew seeds. I have 5 trees from seed that were planted about a year and a half and they are about 1.5m tall today.

When I get seeds, I soak them in water and between 1 and 3 days they will start to germinate. These seeds will be potted or bagged until I can get to the farm. I usually plant them during the rainy season since I'm not there during the week to water the new plants. I'll have to ask the sister in law the age of her two cashew trees and when it started to produce cashews.

Hi Mike,

  Here's some great info on Cashew trees.

    How To Plant Cashew Trees

Fresh seeds germinate readily, so if you know of a cashew tree in your area, or have another way of getting hold of fresh seeds (that's the whole thing, shell and all, not just the nut!), you can grow cashew trees from seed.

But be aware that cashew seeds don't grow true to type, meaning, the plant you get is not identical to the parent. (It may not fruit as much or taste as nice.)

Some fruit tree nurseries stock seedling or grafted trees. Commercial growers usually propagate their own. If you have a grower in the area you may be able to buy stock of him.

If you want to grow your cashew trees from seeds you can start them in pots or put them straight in the ground. Keep them moist and they should sprout within four or five days.


Please see: http://www.tropicalpermaculture.com/growing-cashews.html