Project Avocado - THREE TO SIX WEEKS

After 3 weeks – seed cracks getting bigger

By third week, i had lost two pits. One completely broken into two pieces *kids...*. One not showing any progress at all, so down to one. This is a slow process, with real patience needed. I've moved the surviving pit to  a smaller container filled with gel.

Finally by 6th week, i saw a single root shooting out from the bottom. Still waiting for the top part to sprout though. Don't hold your breath :)

After 4 weeks – we can see the tiny root of about half inch long

After 5 weeks – 1.5″ root is showing

Project Avocado - ONE WEEK

avocado seed - 1 week

Two out of three seeds now showing cracks at the fault line. The other one was intact. I have been adding water instead of replacing them as the hot weather here dries the water pretty quickly.

Project Avocado - kick off

I had my first taste of the creamy avocado at a dinner party in Tony Roma's, a simple crispy bread with avocado dipping. Appetizer has never looked the same since :) So i fell in love with this fruit, and its freakin' expensive that i had to limit when buying. Love 'em so much that i wanted to grow the tree myself.

Before things got too excited, i found that avocado trees that grew from the pit may take long time to yield. I'm talking about 5 to 13 years! and often with unsure quality. So I might have to try grafting once these babies grow, but for now i'll just enjoy this little adventure documenting growing avocados from seeds.

Grafting: taking a branch from a good variety, joining it to your avocado rootstock. It should results in fruit identical to the tree which branch was taken, and does so within only two or three years

From smoothie pack to sprouting

So today i have three avocado seeds. I came across many useful and entertaining videos in YouTube about growing the avocado seeds :) but the steps following were adopted from Mr EastCoastMan: https://youtu.be/CTR1oZimeAM

• Get a few ripe avocados. I have three.


• Peel the avocados, while peeling recognize which side is top and bottom. I've only seen top pointed end and broad bottom so far.

To easily get to the seed, i would cut the avocado in half around the seed carefully as not to damage the seed. Sometimes i cut them to quarter size. Then twist the sections like arubic cube to split the sides. Notice the natural fault-line on the seed, this is where the seed cracks and split during germination.

• You may now bite, chew, devour, feed on the creamy avocados.


• Once you get the seed, wash until it's clean to avoid mold from growing.


• Peel the seed coat off. I sensed that doing this while the seed still wet is easier than while having it dry. Although i did found another writer which says the opposite so i guess its a matter of preference.


• Then insert several toothpicks at the sides, avoiding the fault line. Since i didn't have toothpicks, i just used clean satay bamboo sticks to prick on the sides enough to support and balance the seeds in water.


• Fill in water enough to submerge bottom half of the seed.

I am not sure if the direct sunlight would bake the seeds so i left the containers just outside the kitchen instead where it is warm and bright.