biodiverseed:COLD-HARDY AVOCADOSPictured:Persea americana ‘WilmaTM’ [hardy to -9.5˚ C]Persea a

biodiverseed:COLD-HARDY AVOCADOSPictured:Persea americana ‘WilmaTM’ [hardy to -9.5˚ C]Persea americana ‘Lila’ [hardy to -9.5˚ C]Persea americana ‘Brazos Belle’ [hardy to -9.5˚ C]Persea americana ‘Poncho’ [hardy to -9.5˚ C]The worst ‘free advice’ I get on a regular basis running this blog is: “… don’t plant seeds from commercial fruit; they won’t be like the parent plant!”To me, that’s exactly the point.Every single new cultivar of plant that is not a sport, or a genetically modified crop, has resulted from sexual reproduction and random mutations.Whether it be a chance seedling like the ‘Granny Smith’ or the ‘Red Delicious’ apple, or the result of 50 years of breeding like the 'Romance Series’ of Dwarf Sour Cherries, every delicious fruit you find in a supermarket or farmer’s market exists because someone planted a seed.The Hass avocado, which you have definitely tasted if you have eaten this fruit, was planted by a Mail Carrier.Breeding plants from home is a lot like playing the stock market: you win some, you lose some, but statistically-speaking, a diverse portfolio almost guarantees you some degree of success.I am on the climactic edge of where avocados can grow: but our winters are getting warmer every year. Numerous cultivars of avocado—subspecies found growing wild in the cooler highlands of Mexico, or seedlings from the Southern United States—have resulted in Avocado plants that can tolerate temperatures of roughly -9.5˚ C. Their arid requirements make them a bad choice for any old landscape in rainy Denmark, but in a sheltered, dry microclimate, with a little bit of winter protection, I could conceivably grow an avocado outdoors in Scandinavia.A gardener in Utah, USA, engaged in breeding landraces, has seen non-hardy fruit and nut trees adapt to his climate, within his lifetime.Instead of composting my leftover avocado pits, or starting them indoors, I’m going to start throwing them out in the garden and seeing what happens: you should too! There may be two hundred avocado trees that die before they even start living, and ten trees with inedible fruit, but all it takes is one success to make a new cultivar. Nature is amazingly adaptable!Related: Cold-Hardy CitrusHelp this blog plant 10,000 trees in 2015#darwinist gardening #plant breeding #evolution #avocado -- source link

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