Growing avocados is surprisingly easy, making it a suitable project for both experienced gardeners and beginners. Having access to fresh, homegrown avocados is truly rewarding. If you want to know when avocado trees begin fruiting, how to recognize ripe fruits, and other important details, continue reading this guide.
When Do Avocado Trees Start Bearing Fruit?
A grafted avocado tree typically needs 3 to 4 years to start producing fruit. In contrast, an avocado tree grown from seed requires at least 10 years to fruit, and some varieties may take up to 15 years before producing avocados.
Regarding the fruiting season, it depends largely on the chosen cultivar. Most avocado varieties produce harvest-ready fruits from late winter to early summer. However, certain types may extend their harvest period, and many varieties can hold ripe fruits on the tree for several months.
Signs of Avocado Fruit Maturity
- Avocados should be picked while they are still green and firm, as they do not ripen on the tree. Instead, they must be brought indoors to ripen properly.
- You can tell whether stored avocados are ripe by gently pressing the top end. If the flesh yields slightly, the fruit is fully ripe. Ripe avocados also have uniformly soft flesh throughout.
- Color changes may indicate ripeness, but this varies widely by variety and is not a reliable universal indicator.
- The natural falling of a few mature fruits can be a general sign of ripeness. However, this is not always dependable because extended flowering periods cause fruits to mature at different stages.
- It is advisable to select the largest fruit first, as larger ones tend to ripen earlier. After picking, avocados generally need one to two weeks at room temperature to fully ripen.
- You can pick one fruit and place it indoors with a banana to speed up ripening. If it ripens well, this indicates that the other fruits on the tree are also ready for harvest.
Reasons Why an Avocado Tree May Not Produce Fruit
- First, it’s essential to understand that avocado trees take time to produce fruit, and the fruiting timeline differs depending on whether the tree was grown from seed or grafted.
- Climate has a strong impact on fruiting. If the tree is grown in a cold region, it may survive but never produce fruit.
- Avocados often alternate between heavy production one year and lighter production the next, which can be mistaken for poor fruiting.
- Flowering patterns can significantly delay fruiting. Avocado flowers open as male and female at different times of the day, making pollination difficult. To improve pollination and increase fruit production, gardeners are advised to plant multiple avocado varieties near each other.
- Overuse of nitrogen-rich fertilizers encourages leaf growth at the expense of fruit production.
