Looking good! I have “space for a greenhouse envy 
” I have to make do with a grow light and a tiny room below my basement steps like Harry Potter right now haha.
How long will it take to get fruit on the frankentree? I have 2 seedlings in the HP room from grocery store seeds and I’m not sure I’ll ever get them to fruit in Pennsylvania, even under the light inside all winter.
Out of my 4 larger grafted trees destined for the greenhouse, I’m expecting two of them to start flowering within the next year, since those are already a couple years old and I’ve only added a couple small grafts on each one (I won’t allow those new grafts to set fruit that soon, even if they try). So, hopefully I’ll get Brazos Belle and Poncho to flower in about a year, with first fruit the next winter.
The two most heavily grafted trees are almost entirely new scions, so probably at least two years until I’ll let those set any fruit.
As for your seedlings, my vote would be to graft something onto them for a better chance of fruit, but as long as you’re letting them out from spring to fall, they might still bear fruit eventually on their own. My understanding from the literature (not personal experience yet) is that most seedlings start to flower when they reach around 8-12’ in height, with poor fruit set and fruit quality for their first few years. How long it takes to get that size in those growing conditions is the real question. They also usually flower after cold (though there’s wide variation among varieties on flowering time), so you may want to move them out slowly early in the spring to let them get a bit more cold in the hope of triggering earlier flowering.
I will check back in with you in a few years and see what you come up with haha
I’ll let you know how the 50+ foot tall mexican seedling planted in 1990 faired in our recent artic-mageddon week of freezing weather to 14F that is located in Lake Jackson, TX. I saw it shortly after the freeze and it wasn’t looking too good. It is 24+ inches in diameter at the base. 1989 was the last artic freezing event here. My friend did prove that the A/B blooming trees don’t matter in bearing fruit here in Texas. His lone tree keeps the squirrels well fed with “guacamole on the half shell.”
I know of several insane people that keep re-planting avocado trees in the Houston, TX area 8b/9a zone. Insane in that they insist the 21st tree they plant won’t freeze like the first 20 in a row did. Good luck to them and you.
This is a very long term project where I fully expect most of the seedlings to die, but I’m happy to look forward to some productive trees in the greenhouse, and if I do manage to breed a tree that is hardy here (which I accept is a long shot) then that would be a bonus really.
I do hope that seedling tree near you manages to regrow from the main branches, and if so then some day I’ll have to try and get some seeds or scionwood from it!
It’s been a bit, so thought it might be a good time for an update on the growing family of avocado trees whose demise I’m plotting.
Since my last update, I’ve moved most of the germinating seeds and seedlings into the greenhouse, and the seedlings in there alone are starting to get too numerous for a family photo:
There are also two aspirational frankentrees in the ground in the greenhouse:
I also have a largeish Poncho tree grafted on West Indies rootstock, so I’ve hesitated planting it out, but it’s doing ok in the greenhouse and even has a stray flower bundle almost ready to open:
Finishing out the in-greenhouse collection, my first successful graft of Joey on a Hass seedling:
Next up, for the outside avocado trees, starting with the original Mexicola seedling that I planted out in the middle of winter, intending it to be euthanasia because it had root rot.
However, it is now pushing two new shoots after experiencing multiple hard frosts and a colder than normal early spring:
All the other seedlings that were planted out prematurely (other than a Hass) are pushing new growth and looking ok considering the multiple frosts that I expected to be too much for such small seedlings (these are Mexicola Grande, Mexicola, and Mexicola Grande seedlings):
The Mexicola seedling that has been outside in its clay pot is looking the best of all the outside trees:
While on my trip to Florida over the last few weeks, I met up with Oliver Moore in Gainesville and got a seedling of either May or Del Rio, grafted with Jade and another ungrafted May/Del Rio seedling that had nice smelling leaves and vigorous growth. They’re in the mail now, so will have to wait for the next update to share photos!
Is there a murderers anonymous or something, I can join?
I think this is my third tree that’s on it’s way out. Not sure what’s causing tip browning on the new growth, nibbles off new leaves, and spider mites that REFUSE to die after 3 drenchings of Neem oil. Grrr
The browning of older leaf tips looks like salt buildup, but the newer leaf issues looks like insect/mite damage.
What’s your mineral content in your water? Might be time for something more than neem if those mites are that persistent…
Yeah, I knew the older leaves were a salt buildup, but I’ve never seen such aggressive mites. I’ve literally soaked the tree 3-4 times.
Any recommendations for something stronger?
I’m using Ortho Tree & Shrub Fruit Tree Spray against Aphids.It does contain Neem and a couple other things.Spider Mites are listed on the label.
https://www.ortho.com/en-us/products/garden/ortho-tree-shrub-fruit-tree-spray-concentrate
Pyrethrins and soap have been my go-to bigger gun for aphids, in cases where neem isn’t enough. Monterey’s “Take Down Garden Spray” concentrate is a good pyrethrins source, and I mix it with concentrated insecticidal soap like Natural Guard’s. For smaller or spot application, Safer’s “EndAll” RTU spray works well. It’s pre-mixed pyrethrins, soap, and neem.
Thanks guys. These are stubborn.
The two trees that I mailed to myself from Florida appear to have survived the journey (a little worse for the wear), and I’ve repotted them so they can settle into their new home:
Here’s a photo of Jade fruit: https://www.instagram.com/p/B2HC2KAgebg/
And here’s the description copied from the Instagram post above:
Presenting ‘Jade’, the newest cold-hardy avocado variety. These fruits are from a seedling tree which is making its first-ever crop of fruit this year, and wow are they fantastic.
A number of us here in North Florida have been planting out seeds from good named varieties of cold-hardy avocado. This mixing & matching of genes has produced some good-fruiting new avocado trees, but one young seedling tree in particular really caught our attention this year with its superior fruits. It is clearly worth propagating, so we gave it the variety name, ‘Jade’. The black-skinned fruits of ‘Jade’ are larger than many of the cold hardy Mexican-subspecies varieties (we weighed one at 5.6 oz), with a good flesh-to-seed ratio, and an outstanding flavor. The taste has the rich, oily flavor of other Mexican varieties, and a creamy, mayonaise-like texture. The thin edible skin is pleasant-flavored, with little of the piney flavors some types have.
My friend Oliver brought several ‘Jade’ fruits to an avocado-growing workshop he presented this week, including this exciting new variety at a tasting table with samples of a number of other cold-hardy avocado varieties that are currently ripe. All the avocado samples were delicious, but most people’s favorite was ‘Jade’. A number of attendees asked if they could buy a ‘Jade’ tree, and we had to explain to them, “Right now there’s only one tree in the whole world of this variety, and you’re among the first people who’ve gotten to taste its fruits!” There’s one cloud over this exciting new cultivar: the owner of the land where the ‘Jade’ tree is growing is in the process of listing the property for sale. We will likely lose access to this outstanding tree, and if the new owners don’t find value in having fruit trees, they could remove it.
So the day after the avocado workshop, Oliver and I drove out to the property on a mission to rescue the ‘Jade’ avocado, and we attempted a number of methods to propagate the tree. Hopefully we’ll be successful, and this outstandingly promising new avocado cultivar won’t get lost, so many more people can enjoy its rich, creamy fruits in future years.
Love the ‘Jade’ back story!
This is a little off-topic, but I just wanted to take a moment to appreciate the incredible genetic diversity of the avocado. For example, all of the following photos are all seedlings of @Marta’s Royal-Wright variety.
These seedlings include a number of leaf shapes:
Stem coloration ranges from bright pink to different shades of green with red or purple flecks:
Some leaves have ruffled edges while others are straight:
And those all share the same seed parent! Some seeds from other cold hardy varieties that I’m growing have leaves that are almost round, or others have long slender ones that look almost like mangos:
Even if all this genetic diversity isn’t enough to find Seattle-level hardiness, it’s still something to behold.
Just thought I’d share some photos of an interesting genetic trait in one of @Marta’s Royal-Wright seedlings, where branching occurs in Y shape nodes with a single deformed leaf that forms simultaneously to the two growing tips:
You can also see the stems have a thin depression down the center just below the branching node, almost as if it is already two branches that are conjoined.
After reassessing how many 3 to 5 gallon pots I’d need to pot up all the avocado seedings from their 1 gallon seed-starting pots, I decided to go ahead and plant out some more over the next few weeks. Here are about 2/3 of the 1 gal pots:
I started by planting the largest and most vigorous seedling of Royal-Wright (No. 84, first photo below) and Purple Nebula (No. 96, second photo):
They join two seedlings of Mexicola Grande and one of Mexicola that have been in the ground since February, all of which have started pushing new growth recently. I’ll probably plant out at least 3 more seedlings over the next few days, and then pot up the rest to 3 or 5 gal pots as needed over the summer.
And speaking of the larger seedlings, including a few recently grafted with known varieties, these 3 and 5 gal plants will all be in the greenhouse next winter, but for this summer and fall they will get half-day sun by the north fence in my back yard:
Next up, I wanted to share the beautiful foliage on Poncho/Pancho, in its 15 gal pot in the greenhouse:
It opened about 5 flowers when it had that flush of growth, but as expected none set fruit.
And finally, some Bacon and Sharwil seedlings I’ve just grafted with small scions of Brazos Belle, Aravaipa and Poncho:
Damn, now this one was the first victim of the heat wave, it just melted this afternoon. I’m trying emergency water resuscitation but time will tell. Poor little plant survives root rot and multiple hard frosts, but it’s the record breaking heat that does it in? In Seattle? Who would’ve guessed?!
Some other seedlings that were planted out seem to be loving the heat. These are two phenotypes of Royal-Wright seedlings:
I guess it’s no surprise that seedlings of a plant known to flourish in the CA Central Valley can handle mere 100ish° without issue.
