Grow Your Own Avocado…

OK, you are very unlikely to put Waitrose out of business as to get an avocado to flower, never mind fruit, here in the UK is a pretty long shot, but Persea americana makes for an interesting house or conservatory plant that is very easy to grow from seed…

The plant pictured I grew from a seed taken from an avocado bought in a market in Mallorca two years ago. It is currently just under a metre tall and from the growth already this spring looks like it wants to make ceiling height by the end of the summer… Avocados will grow to 20m in their native tropics, but growing in a container will at least constrain them a bit. The internet suggests that they can be cut back hard as and when they outgrow their space, but I’ve yet to try this with mine…

There are any number of complicated techniques suggested to successfully germinate avocado seeds, but I simply put the seed in my airing cupboard* inside a small sealed sandwich bag with some damp (not sodden) compost. After about four weeks it had germinated, so I potted it up in a 50:50 mix of John Innes No.3 and sharp sand for good drainage and put it out in my conservatory. Keep well watered and give a weekly feed with dilute seaweed extract during spring and summer but ease off the watering and stop feeding completely during autumn and winter. Avocados are tender so need to be kept frost free, but equally can struggle with the drying effects of central heating, in which case a regular spray of the leaves with water or putting them in a well-lit bathroom (away from radiators or heated towel-rails) can help prevent leaf scorching

* PS: Readers from Northern Ireland may be wondering what an “airing cupboard” is… My darling wife, aka “Belfast Blonde”, refers to a “hot press”, which had me equally bewildered for quite a long time…