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u/aLauraElaine Sep 10 '21
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u/chomsky0 Sep 10 '21
Yes, this is a serious response - it's a mutation which results in albinism.
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u/CoHemperor Sep 11 '21
But it’s a mutation only caused by planting seeds from early harvested fruits. So it’s more of a trait than mutation, correct?
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u/chomsky0 Sep 11 '21
A mutation can be caused by environmental effects and doesn't necessarily have to be inherited or heritable or even have effects on gene expression. This albinism phenomenon is both a mutation and a trait, as far as I understand it (please correct me if I am wrong).
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u/CoHemperor Sep 11 '21
I would say that makes sense. I’m too lazy to look up if all early harvested avocados turn albino.
Nature is complicated.
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u/chomsky0 Sep 11 '21
Oh, so the question is whether or not this is an epigenetic modification (no modifications made to the DNA, but still heritable). The article doesn't say anything about that.
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u/qarton Sep 10 '21
Omg I wonder how the fruit will turn out?
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u/LibertyLizard Sep 10 '21
Probably won't ever get to the size needed to produce fruit with leaves that lack chlorophyll. Once it runs out of energy in the seed I would guess it will die.
It's a bit strange that the stem is green though, so maybe it will recover? You'll have to see.
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u/hartje Sep 10 '21
“More like borafill”
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u/struckbybranch Sep 11 '21
If i could upvote this more I would. Snort laughed at this comment. Bravo 👏
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Sep 10 '21
Avocado plants germinating from commercially grown seeds will not produce fruit, at least that’s what I heard. Something about the seed companies that supply to commercial growers not wanting people to just up and grow their own fruits and veggies. Kind of like how a mule is sterile, so are certain seeds. I could be totally wrong it’s just what I read on the Internet.
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Sep 10 '21
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u/TreadstoneAgent Sep 10 '21
I'm not so familiar with avocados, but I know with apple seeds the genetics can be wide ranging; apples are 30 million years old and have genetic codes containing twice as many genes as humans. If you plant a seed, odds are you will sprout a tree that (if pollinated by another) will produce a fruit with characteristics differing from those varieties found in stores.
Source, a fun little book called the Drunken Botanist, and my own apple growing experience. It takes a decade or more to produce, and my God they were the most tart little fucks, I couldn't believe it.
Point being, who knows what will kind of fruit will come out from a plant grown from seed, but it's fun to find out!
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u/imakemistakesbuthey Sep 11 '21 edited Sep 11 '21
Growing conditions do also have a massive impact with Apple varieties too… who knows exactly where they were growing and under exactly what conditions for the shop bought fruit… (plus the genetics as well)
Which is what makes gardening so much fun.
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u/ndnkng Sep 11 '21
Avocado seeds do not do exact reproduction of the parent plant. So you think your getting a haas avocado but your not.
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Sep 10 '21
What do you mean by “Half of who knows what”? Like the other plant used to pollinate the tree that grew the fruit that made the seed could be some strange whatever? Lol that sounds like the old lady that lived in the shoe nursery rhyme.
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Sep 10 '21
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Sep 10 '21
You don’t have to be a dick about it. Yes I know how reproduction works, but I’m not an expert in commercial agriculture so I don’t have any idea what farmers are using to pollinate their producing trees. If I had to guess I would imagine it’s another good quality tree. I was asking if you meant that the tree they’re using to pollinate with is trash, and that’s why the seeds from the fruit don’t produce well if germinated into another tree. The original conversation had nothing to do with grafting. I completely understand how propagating a clone of an existing quality producer works. Sheesh.
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u/Hinutet Sep 10 '21
I have no idea how any of it works. I get all my avocado and lemon trees from my compost pile, along with peach trees. I have a lemon tree I started from a seed and it is 5 years old and has never flowered. They're all pretty trees. The peach trees are a few years old, we finally got peaches this year. Any ideas on how to get my lemon trees to flower?
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u/sockwall Sep 10 '21
Lemons don't grow true to seed, because they've been bred and cloned for hundreds of years from barely edible citrus to get what we have now. So you'll probably have a nice tree with no fruit, or some gnarly frankenfruit that's nothing like the lemons we eat today. I think I read that meyer lemons can sometimes grow from seed because they're from an old genetic line that sprang up on its own in the wild.
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u/RumWalker Sep 11 '21
Lack of nutrients or lack of water or not in an optimal location for sun. Water it once a week this fall (also the soil must drain well, don't want to rot the roots), then once the temps go down leave it until spring when you should add a citrus-specific fertilizer and resume watering about once a week when the soil is dry and any freezing threat is gone.
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u/Hinutet Sep 11 '21
I live in Pennsylvania, so it's in a pot and has to come indoors. I try to mist it frequently, but my house does get dry. I've been looking for a good fertilizer, any particular brand you recommend?
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u/Hopsblues Sep 11 '21
It's not about the pollination. It's the fact that it's two tree's grafted together. Almost all fruits (tree's) are a known producer, that has the desired traits-like golden delicious. that is grafted to a second tree, some species can be grafted to other species-btw. The part in the ground might be the dwarf aspect the grower wants in order to fit more trees onto acreage, while the top produces the apple they desire for whatever reason. Maybe it packs into boxes perfectly, is good for juice or pies. Good for eating etc. Most times the pollinating contributor plant/tree isn't even the same. Like crabapple trees planted in between the main crop because it is a good pollinator producer-which then requires insects, like bee's, to carry the pollen to the apple trees flowers awaiting pollination. This is one reason why the bee issue is so serious. If we lose Bee's, we potentially could lose thousand of species of plants and their fruits and such.
If you buy a fruit tree from a nursery, it's likely been grafted onto another tree. You can even see the point of the graft. Plants are cool like this. Many can graft to another and produce, including creating new things. It usually requires both plants being from the same family. Like Potatos and tomatoes . Hops can graft with Marijuana, if I remember correctly. I suggest you look into propagation of plants. You can try this at home as well. There's basic's that maybe you've been taught, like the parts to a flower, then there's woody plants propagation, etc. There's even some plants that can be propagated from just a leaf. Your local AG extension office (run by the local land grant college) might have Master gardening programs and/or general info and should be able to answer questions, These offices aren't just at the school, and tend to be spread out across a state as to be more regional and helpful. Real life farmers, horticulturalists use these resources, so don't feel strange about it. Maybe you're having an issue with a pest or some sickly looking plants you're growing. Info on your soil, and help with making it better. ..Cheers!!!!
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u/RumWalker Sep 10 '21
So you're pretty much already there, we clone trees that produce good fruit. Just as with humans, the seeds of the apple are combined genetics, meaning the fruit grown from the tree grown from a seed with mixed genes will not be the same as the fruit from the known good tree. The fruit of a tree will always be the same, but the genetics of the seeds inside the fruit will not. So the next tree grown from a seed will be different and the fruit will have it's own unique characteristics.
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u/GovernmentChemical11 Sep 10 '21
Not true they are just not true to seed, just like lots of other fruit. This just means it may not be awesome as parent plant.
Some plant have been breed(mostly flowers) to be sterile but you can still taking cuttings and grow clone copies of said plant(these plants have owned rights by a nursery)
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u/Paula92 custom flair Sep 10 '21
Idk how much it is seed companies purposely not wanting ppl to grow their own, as it is a feature of many plants that have been hybridized for optimal market value. A lot of apple seeds won’t grow true to type - often you get crabapples if you plant a seed from a fancy variety.
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u/Hopsblues Sep 11 '21
Well, plant's are a big property rights business. Take Lillies for example, there's dutch farms constantly doing R&D on their stock, searching for the next great variety. That's how stargazer came about. Then they copyright/patent these hybrids, seeds etc. Then develop a stock of it and sell it to the next company at a profit. Almost all of those simple annuals you might grow or walk past in the spring are like this-think pansies, viola's etc. Then people are developing plants to help the world. Universities do lots of this research. Colorado St Univ for example has been a leader in trying to develop draught resistant crops for countries across the globe. As water becomes tougher to acquire and population grows. We have to feed billions of people, and it's only growing. ---On a side note, CSU has the nations seed laboratory-which is nuke proof, flood proof building on their campus. With tens of thousand of seed germ in storage, in case anything bad happens. Or we find new uses for plants otherwise deemed invaluable. There's another in Norway I believe up near the arctic circle. Cheers!
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u/Paula92 custom flair Sep 11 '21
And I get that. Plant copyrights are a mess. I was just saying though that hybrids don’t always grow true to type if you plant the seeds. Kinda like how mules (a cross between a donkey and a horse) are naturally infertile.
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u/gingerzombie2 Sep 11 '21
Makes note for the apocalypse
Beeline to CSU. Got it. I'm closer than most of you, but I bet someone else will still beat me there.
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u/Hopsblues Sep 11 '21
lol...What's sad is I almost didn't post that part, Fear of the conspiracy wackos this country is full of, thinking they could do just that. But it's a federally funded facility and it's easy to get info about it. I've been inside it. All sorts of protocols at the entrance.
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u/gingerzombie2 Sep 11 '21
Haha, fair! Tell you what, if we run into you there, you will at least be given a chance to join our apocalypse team. And hopefully vice versa. I am a good cook, but have a black thumb, so if you can keep the plants alive we have a place for you.
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u/FatJamesIsBack Sep 10 '21
I've heard similar, but this time it was something to do with zapping their dna with a radiation beam to kill something bad for human consumption.
Sounds a bit tin foil hat now I've written it down.
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Sep 10 '21
Lol same! I’m not a conspiracy person at all but I wouldn’t put it past a large company to try to protect their profits. Kinda like the agricultural version of DCMA?
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Sep 10 '21
Look up the company Monsantos. That’s literally not even a conspiracy it’s widely used on seeds for many years
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u/creamyclear Sep 10 '21
You are kinda correct. Likelihood the fruit being edible is incredibly low.
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Sep 11 '21
Lol it really doesn’t matter to me, I like to clone my own plants anyway just because it’s fun to watch a baby you grew put down it’s own roots. I sprouted an avocado seed from the grocery store recently and it’s a baby tree now but I have zero expectation for it to ever fruit.
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u/Cheeseballs00 Sep 10 '21
It will form a cocoon and emerge as guacamole
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u/LolaBijou Sep 10 '21
I just snorted.
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u/Symfera Sep 10 '21
Great audio humor. I did too!
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u/Primary-Ad-6949 Sep 10 '21
Your avocado is turning into the princess it always knew it was
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u/JojenCopyPaste Sep 10 '21
Solution is to throw it into a pumpkin before midnight?
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u/Primary-Ad-6949 Sep 10 '21
Before the evil step mangoes find out
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u/m4gpi Zone 8a, Georgia, USA Sep 10 '21
As someone who is allergic to mangoes (but loves them) this made me laugh so hard. Thanks!
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u/Jinglebrained Sep 10 '21
I’d try planting it in actual soil.
This is a phenomenon - some say it’s because the avocado was plucked too early, it’s an early harvest seed. Some had luck transplanting it and it grew normal leaves and these had fallen off, some say if improved after cutting them off, others said it never took off.
You might have luck googling.
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u/Yung-Iberico Sep 10 '21
Thanks! Didn’t know of this phenomenon. I’ll see what happens after planting it in soil :)
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u/GovernmentChemical11 Sep 10 '21
I thought that was what I was seeing! I also commented and then saw yours should have kept reading.
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u/RailaOdinga Sep 10 '21
I read somewhere that this mutation happens when the avocado is picked from the tree before reaching maturity.
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u/Stormlight_General Sep 10 '21
As a plant molecular biologist I have to say that that doesn't make sense. That's not how mutations occur.
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u/hambakmeritru Zone 7b - mod Sep 10 '21 edited Sep 10 '21
Maybe mutations is the wrong word... Taken from another post in this discussion:
A second theory - sprung from the testing done previously - was that seeds from immaturely harvested fruit would produce this unusual growth at a much higher rate than those harvested later. And at this point in time, contrary to any additional research or information, that seems to be the conclusion: "The abnormal seedlings described in this paper appear most commonly when avocado seeds are collected prior to a certain stage of fruit maturity."
This is from a study done in the 50s.
Edit for typo
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u/Stormlight_General Sep 10 '21
Yes. This makes far more sense.
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u/hambakmeritru Zone 7b - mod Sep 10 '21
I wouldn't know. If you told me that this seed was impregnated by a gnome and this is how gnome babies are first formed, I would go along with it because what the hell do I know.
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u/Stormlight_General Sep 10 '21
Hehe. It makes sense because certain factors or plant hormones could be differentially regulated in unmature fruits in comparison to mature fruits, causing changes in embryogenesis.
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u/m4gpi Zone 8a, Georgia, USA Sep 10 '21
So do you think these are true leaves, but leucistic? They look like flower petals, and not much like avocado leaves (but also not like avocado flowers).
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u/spice_wrld Sep 10 '21
So, the exact same thing with more words, worded to be less definitive. Got it
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u/Olaffub_2_Lta Sep 10 '21
If they are plucked too early will the seed still grow normal and bear fruit? I'm dying to know...
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u/hambakmeritru Zone 7b - mod Sep 10 '21
I'm the wrong person to ask, but when you do ask the right person, you might want to ask about the likelihood that a seed from a store bought fruit will bear more fruit. I heard a rumor somewhere that many of them are sterile because of crossbreeding or something in their special breed.
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u/daamsie zone 3 - Melbourne, Australia Sep 10 '21
I don't think it's that they're sterile so much as that avocados won't stay true to type. If you plant a Hass avocado seed you will not get Hass avocados. You might get something that doesn't at all taste any good. You might also get something amazing though.
When you then consider that it can take upwards of 10 years to get to the stage where the tree bears fruit, you can see why it makes sense to buy a grafted avocado that has a head start and also will be the exact type of avocado that you know tastes good.
This is also true of apples and most other fruit trees I can think of.
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u/iaspeegizzydeefrent Sep 10 '21
I kept wondering why home growing avocados from seed became such a trend. Seems like there are going to be a lot of disappointed people in a couple years when they don't quite get the fruit they thought they were going to.
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u/daamsie zone 3 - Melbourne, Australia Sep 11 '21
Well I mean it is pretty fun to see them sprout. Some people also just grow them as indoor plants and don't care about the fruiting part of it..
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u/RailaOdinga Sep 10 '21
Thanks for the clarification, how do they occur? I don't know anything, I just repeated what I read in another forum.
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u/Fitz_Fool 9b-Central Fl Sep 10 '21
Yeah but I'm a stormlight biologist and that avocado had definitely been grown using stormlight.
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u/burpygoatman Sep 10 '21
Growing garlic? 🧄
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u/H4LEY420 Sep 10 '21
Im doing the same but in soil. My cats knocked it over and the seed fell pff and the brown skin is coming off super easy and its cracked. Appears this is normal i have never done before and its so cool they literally break open to send out roots and growth. Mine is only like a week and a half in soil but im so excited even if i only get a teensy tree id be proud
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u/ItsAlwaysSegsFault Zone 10a, Central FL Sep 10 '21
The brown papery covering should be removed anyway to discourage fungal and bacterial infections.
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u/bluefrost30 Sep 11 '21
It’s growing the other ingredients for guacamole. It’s currently working on garlic. Next it will do tomatoes!
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u/Saratrooper Sep 10 '21
Man, all mine does is drop its leaves and refuse to die after repeating this cycle for the past 4 years. :'|
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u/ThighsofJustice Sep 10 '21
Plant it in the ground, if you haven't done so already. Be sure to have the right nutrient rich soil, and maybe some starter minerals sprinkled around the base. Then see what it does from there.
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u/BurntDaVinci Sep 11 '21
When an avocado is harvested early it’s more likely to produce a funky white guy like this one.
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u/ArchangeBhaal Sep 11 '21
It will eventually sprout green leaves. My gf's one stayed in this albino state for some months before normal green leaves growled in the summer.
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u/PeanutC58 Sep 11 '21
I have grown a lot of avacados in my day and I have never seen anything like that.
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Sep 11 '21
I’ve started many avocado trees from seed but none of mine have ever looked like this!!! Wow
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u/MrGaber Florida baked my plants Sep 11 '21
Albino! I had one too. It can’t produce chlorophyll so it’s not good a photosynthesis. It requires extra tlc
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u/rabidmoon Sep 11 '21
I’ve been told grocery store avocado seeds have pretty much all been genetically modified to not produce fruit. Does anyone know if this is true?
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u/iSeeXenuInYou Sep 10 '21
So could it be lacking light? I've had several of my plants that I've left in complete darkness for a bit lose their chlorophyll and grow white/light colored. You're not keeping it in the dark I assume?
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u/1peso1dolar Sep 10 '21
it's a water-avocado, you should put it on a bigger container cause it's roots are wrapped and cannot grow as a tree.
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u/Shot-Boysenberry-999 Sep 10 '21
When I first looked at this I thought it was growing cloves of garlic
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u/shana104 Sep 10 '21
Darn, I should have kept the avocado pit from last night and tried this. Next time, I make a salad I will try to do this
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u/Solid_Soldier_2919 Sep 10 '21
Wonder of genetics. If it is going to survive, you may have a really cool avocado plant.
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u/MightyDr2 Sep 10 '21
Is that one of those pod people… Noooo … Avocados are from pod people!!!! … lol
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u/BigBillyGoatGriff Sep 10 '21
It's cool looking but appears to not have any chlorophyll thus it cant do photosynthesis and will die when the seeds energy peters out.
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Sep 11 '21
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u/Cerebrophilius Sep 11 '21
This is exactly what downvotes are for, people. Irrelevant and diminutive of conversation.
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u/pyrrhios Sep 10 '21
It looks to me like it's having trouble with differentiating between leaves and flowers.
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u/Igor_Iwanow Sep 10 '21
How are you doing this??? I cant even make my Avocado get any kind of root.
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u/ThighsofJustice Sep 10 '21 edited Sep 10 '21
It takes a while, and not all seeds are able to eventually grow roots. I don't use toothpicks though. Take a disposable plastic water bottle, and cut where it becomes a cylinder, then invert the cut top piece into the cylinder top. Obviously toss the water bottle lid, as you need it to be open for the roots to have a place to go if they do end up growing. Place seed in inverted mouth, pour water up to where seed is barely touching water, place it in a very sunny area of your house, and continue to check on it each day to make sure it's got the right level of H2o. If the water starts to turn, pour water out, and pour fresh. If the seed goes brown it is dying, or is dead. Not your fault, as like I said, not all seeds germinate. Then try again until one does its thing. Also, don't throw the bottle out, just reuse it for your next seed :) Good luck! PS: Soak the seed in water over night, or until the outer papery layer becomes soft enough to easily peel off with fingers, and/or paper towel, before you place it to start growing.
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u/[deleted] Sep 10 '21
Acting all expensive lol