Author Topic: Success planting an Avocado after 8 years of failures and 5 dead trees!  (Read 51070 times)

Pancrazio

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Re: Success planting an Avocado after 8 years of failures and 5 dead trees!
« Reply #125 on: July 09, 2016, 07:11:00 PM »
Has anyone else had success using this method of direct seeding avocado seeds and grafting onto the seedling? I just visited my friend and his tree is doing great. He has also grafted a couple other varieties onto the Reed seedling right next to the Hass I grafted for him.

Hi!
I have always wanted an avocado in my home,  so after 3 dead trees i have been looking forward to apply this method to get finally the plants I want. Last year I managed to seed two avocados in place. I guess they were pinkerton seeds (grocery store). I was hoping to have them grafted with a couple of cultivars: one of them was Mexicola and the other one is a chance seedling a friend of mine grew that was able to withstand pretty extreme cold snaps (-8/-10C or 14/17F) and of decent quality. 
At the end of last summer i was able to graft only this variety on the seedling i planted... but too bad, after initial the initial attempt to push (graft was healed) the winter came, and the union point died back during winter (is a common problem for me, i think because if grafts joins too late in winter callous tissue can't differentiate in mature enough wood before winter comes.... and winter for me is pretty cold/damp).
So, this year started again with two seeds, but i didn't plant them directly in ground - in fact I’m ashamed to admit that grafting low in the stem young avocados that were already situated in a hole in the ground has been remarkably difficult for me. So i prepared a couple of pretty long pots, filled them with the soil taken from the exact space I’m going to plant the avocados (it is pretty rich in clay, actually) and i have grown the seedling there. I think that they will be ready to accept graft in a couple of week.
I have just a major setback in the fact that i'm unable to locate a source of Mexicola avocadoes in europe, but as far asthe other avocado is concerned, i should be able to get at least a plant.
I hope to be able to obtain, using the same soil of the desired location and the pot growing, bot the advantages of this method and the easiness for grafts of the pot grown plants.
Too bad avocado seeds are really slow to sprout, the two plants i'm about to graft are from fruits i used in january.
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barath

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Re: Success planting an Avocado after 8 years of failures and 5 dead trees!
« Reply #126 on: September 02, 2016, 08:58:07 PM »
Simon, I'm curious at what stage / size / time you've had the best luck grafting your direct-seeded Avocados.  I have ~50 of them in the ground now and they're various sizes -- between 2 inch sprouts and 2 foot vigorous seedlings.  Here in the East Bay I've had the best luck grafting Avocados in February, but that's on mature in-ground trees rather than seedlings.

Thanks!

simon_grow

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Re: Success planting an Avocado after 8 years of failures and 5 dead trees!
« Reply #127 on: September 04, 2016, 08:25:05 AM »
Hey Barath, I have not grafted many Avocado plants. Besides the plant I grafted for my friend, I have only grafted Avocado a handful of other times. I don't recall the exact season I grafted my friends seedling but I think it was around late Spring or early Summer. I remember the seedling was about sharpie thickness and about 3 feet tall.

I would wait until your seedling is well established and just starting to push new growth.

Simon

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Re: Success planting an Avocado after 8 years of failures and 5 dead trees!
« Reply #128 on: September 04, 2016, 08:39:00 AM »
Simon, I'm curious at what stage / size / time you've had the best luck grafting your direct-seeded Avocados.  I have ~50 of them in the ground now and they're various sizes -- between 2 inch sprouts and 2 foot vigorous seedlings.  Here in the East Bay I've had the best luck grafting Avocados in February, but that's on mature in-ground trees rather than seedlings.

Thanks!

It's a very good question, I have some 2 to 3 year old direct seeded avocado trees and was looking at the same question. I have read in an old publication that I cannot find back, that the old groves in California were originally established by direct seeding and grafting. Only later they started grafting in the nursery and planting out those trees, and if I remember correctly it was a trade-off between the grafts taking much better in nursery conditions and the rootsystems getting much better established from direct seeds.

So I guess the time of grafting is pretty critical. The tree must be in a growth flush, there must be enough water in the soil to keep it growing for another couple of weeks, and you must be able to protect the graft from drying out or overheating in the sun. Maybe now that we have parafilm, which the oldtimers didn't have, we have the ability to do that and we can get a higher percentage of takes on direct seeded rootstock. But I would wait for springtime, unless you can irrigate.

Solko

barath

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Re: Success planting an Avocado after 8 years of failures and 5 dead trees!
« Reply #129 on: September 04, 2016, 12:33:24 PM »
Great, thanks!  I will try a few different times for grafting them then.  I think I'm also going to try using rooting hormone in the grafts to see if I can get them to take even not during the exact right season.

Mark in Texas

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Re: Success planting an Avocado after 8 years of failures and 5 dead trees!
« Reply #130 on: September 06, 2016, 10:06:50 AM »
I've had excellent success grafting to Florida pits.  I find that timing is critical - the spring scion wood should be showing buds that are beginning to swell and the rootstock should either be pushing new spring growth or very close to it.  Some folks graft in the fall. I guess if that's the only time you can get scions then you have no choice.  It's active growth timing for me.

I cut a Brogdon down to its Waldin rootstock and grafted 6 scions, 4 varieties last spring - Holiday, Pinkerton, Ardith, Sir Prize.  All took for my new Frankencado.  Here it is a few months ago, its a vigorous larger tree now. I expect a crop next year.



Tips:

1. I believe a very clean cut which results in little to no tissue damage like crushing of the tissue cells results in MUCH better success rates.  Accordingly I always use what Carlos turned me onto - a Schick disposable razor blade held in an Excel #2 medium blade holder.  I no longer use my grafting knife, no matter how sharp it is.

2.  Buddy tape - I got nothing but failures on 3 attempts using parafilm in 2015, same rootstock. I've had 100% success switching over to Buddy Tape.
« Last Edit: September 06, 2016, 10:09:38 AM by Mark in Texas »

Samu

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Re: Success planting an Avocado after 8 years of failures and 5 dead trees!
« Reply #131 on: September 06, 2016, 12:45:36 PM »

I tried to google your no. 1 tip items above with no luck, could you please share the links or where to get them?
Thanks again, Mark!
Sam

Mark in Texas

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Re: Success planting an Avocado after 8 years of failures and 5 dead trees!
« Reply #132 on: September 07, 2016, 08:01:58 AM »
Google links - https://www.walgreens.com/store/c/schick-injector-razor-blades/ID=prod2163368-product

https://www.amazon.com/Excel-K2-Knife-Safety-Cap/dp/B0006NAU60

Insert and tighten the blade inserted half way in.  When not razor sharp anymore, reverse the blade.  Best thing since ice cream.......

Samu

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Re: Success planting an Avocado after 8 years of failures and 5 dead trees!
« Reply #133 on: September 07, 2016, 05:41:42 PM »
Thanks a lot for those links and advice, Mark!
Much appreciated!
Sam

gozp

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Thank u for sharing, simon.

gozp

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Just planted lamb hass & sir prize in-ground in 1hole. :)


simon_grow

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Nice trees, make sure to protect them if we get ultra high heat. The double planting should help to keep their size in check. Please keep us updated on these two!

Simon

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Interesting thread--thanks, all, for sharing your expertise. With regard to grafting avocados, I've had good success grafting onto very young seedlings--occasionally even before leaves have opened. My guess is that this channels the energy stored in the seed into healing the graft and pushing new growth. I usually don't graft when they're quite this young, but here's a good before (Feb 22) and after (April 10) illustration:




I've also started planting an avocado seed next to any newly-planted avocado tree, as a backup. When the seedling is big enough, I graft on a scion from the adjacent plant with the idea of keeping whichever one does best.

simon_grow

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Great looking graft Tusconken! Thanks for sharing your technique. I've had great success with epicotyl grafts on mango and it looks like it may work equally as well on Avocado. I like your idea of planting a seedling next to newly planted Avocado trees as a backup and keeping the one that performs the best. Thanks for sharing your technique!

Simon

Mark in Texas

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Interesting thread--thanks, all, for sharing your expertise. With regard to grafting avocados, I've had good success grafting onto very young seedlings--occasionally even before leaves have opened. My guess is that this channels the energy stored in the seed into healing the graft and pushing new growth. I usually don't graft when they're quite this young, but here's a good before (Feb 22) and after (April 10) illustration:




I've also started planting an avocado seed next to any newly-planted avocado tree, as a backup. When the seedling is big enough, I graft on a scion from the adjacent plant with the idea of keeping whichever one does best.

Good plan!

Did the same thing back in 2012.  Planted Florida pits in early winter and grafted about 6 scions sourced from the U.C.R. collection late Feb.  All took and are bearing well.

simon_grow

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Re: Success planting an Avocado after 8 years of failures and 5 dead trees!
« Reply #140 on: July 18, 2017, 01:44:25 PM »
Here's an update of my friends tree that started this thread. We are keeping it low and bushy for easier harvesting. There are over 100 Avocados on it this year. This tree is also grafted with Reed and a Reed seedling is also growing next to it.





Simon

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Re: Success planting an Avocado after 8 years of failures and 5 dead trees!
« Reply #141 on: July 18, 2017, 05:57:50 PM »
for the reed did you need to do any size control?  I just bought a reed from la verne and it's the first tree that for me I didn't need to do anything to it.   It was a lil over two feet tall and had really nice branching to it.  Do you suggesting tipping to induce more branching?

simon_grow

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Re: Success planting an Avocado after 8 years of failures and 5 dead trees!
« Reply #142 on: July 18, 2017, 07:15:36 PM »
I'm definitely no Avocado expert but I do know that Reeds are columnar and grow vertical and doesn't bush out too much. I would still prune it to keep it low and bushy because I dislike using fruit picking poles to harvest fruit. I prefer to have fruit lower for easier harvesting.

We only Grafted a lower branch so our Reed shouldn't get to big. It's the Hass that we have to worry about.

Simon

Mark in Texas

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Re: Success planting an Avocado after 8 years of failures and 5 dead trees!
« Reply #143 on: October 10, 2017, 10:22:31 AM »
I'm definitely no Avocado expert but I do know that Reeds are columnar and grow vertical and doesn't bush out too much. I would still prune it to keep it low and bushy because....
Simon

Backfired on me, big time.  I topped my Reed low and it turned into this wide football goal post profile with no center, like 15' W.  I've tried to fill in the middle with a branch but the strong apical dominance influence of the horizontal side branches shuts it down.

 Waldo (my wife) is in there....somewhere.   :)



Fygee

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Re: Success planting an Avocado after 8 years of failures and 5 dead trees!
« Reply #144 on: October 11, 2017, 04:19:22 PM »
This is a really interesting method. I'm going ot have to give it a try.

I have a part of my yard with some amended soil and almost full shade. Seedlings typically adjust better to Vegas conditions I've found, at least in terms of mangos that I've played with, so this will be a fun experiment to try.

I'm curious, which rootstock should I grow from seed would have the best soil salt tolerance?
Continuing my journey to disprove those who say "You can't grow that in the desert" since 2013.

Mark in Texas

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Re: Success planting an Avocado after 8 years of failures and 5 dead trees!
« Reply #145 on: October 14, 2017, 09:33:16 AM »
This is a really interesting method. I'm going ot have to give it a try.

I have a part of my yard with some amended soil and almost full shade. Seedlings typically adjust better to Vegas conditions I've found, at least in terms of mangos that I've played with, so this will be a fun experiment to try.

I'm curious, which rootstock should I grow from seed would have the best soil salt tolerance?

Waldin, pure W. Indies, Florida sources.  I chose Florida pits because they usually are pure W. Indies or a hybrid of it by Guatemalan.

simon_grow

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Re: Success planting an Avocado after 8 years of failures and 5 dead trees!
« Reply #146 on: October 14, 2017, 11:01:10 AM »
This is a really interesting method. I'm going ot have to give it a try.

I have a part of my yard with some amended soil and almost full shade. Seedlings typically adjust better to Vegas conditions I've found, at least in terms of mangos that I've played with, so this will be a fun experiment to try.

I'm curious, which rootstock should I grow from seed would have the best soil salt tolerance?

Try several different types if you have access to seeds, some species or hybrids may have better resistance to root rot or salinity than others.

My friend and I are still enjoying the fruits of our labor. The original tree that started this thread is doing great. We topped it low so it’s growing wide and bushy like we wanted.

Simon

Mark in Texas

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Re: Success planting an Avocado after 8 years of failures and 5 dead trees!
« Reply #147 on: October 15, 2017, 11:12:34 AM »
Try several different types if you have access to seeds, some species or hybrids may have better resistance to root rot or salinity than others.

Every Reed seed I've planted has been a failure - no vigor.  Just flat doesn't want to grow and I've planted those that have "tails" while in the fruit, cracked, ripe but no tail....nothing. 

Best rootstock I've found sourced from greenhouse stock is Oro Negro.  Gonna quit throwing away those seeds and sow them if not for me for some of my friends.  Plan to graft a Pinkerton to it early next year.

spaugh

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Re: Success planting an Avocado after 8 years of failures and 5 dead trees!
« Reply #148 on: October 15, 2017, 02:43:13 PM »
Ive got several reed seedlings going.  They need a lot of heat to get started.  They do take 6 to 8 weeks to pop up.  Reed trees also seem to take super hot dry conditions no problem.

Most of the trees available in san diego nurseries are on polinator rootstock.  Mostly zutano or bacon seeds are used for rootstocks here. 
« Last Edit: October 15, 2017, 02:47:39 PM by spaugh »
Brad Spaugh

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Re: Success planting an Avocado after 8 years of failures and 5 dead trees!
« Reply #149 on: October 15, 2017, 04:28:03 PM »
Ive got several reed seedlings going.  They need a lot of heat to get started.  They do take 6 to 8 weeks to pop up.  Reed trees also seem to take super hot dry conditions no problem.

Most of the trees available in san diego nurseries are on polinator rootstock.  Mostly zutano or bacon seeds are used for rootstocks here.

Same here. I ate a bunch of Reeds in early Sept and planted them on my avocado mound. At least half of them have sprouted already.
- Mark