To : Eve
Subject : about Alberto
Date : Mon, 20 Feb 2017 4:29:53 PM -0800 [PST]
hello again, Eve ~
About needing a male and female tree, you’re right. The good news is that, with cross pollination by birds and others, the nearest tree can be as far as a mile away.
Attached is a photo of one of the (Zutano) avocados from 11 years ago. My guess is that the trunk at its widest is ~11 or 12 inches in diameter (about the same as an old LP or 78 phonograph record).
About the name Alberto, as with most other plants, cars and major appliances Diana or Tav named, she tended to use alliterative names (e.g., Alberto avocado, Tyrone [the Toyota], Clara Clavinova [the Yamaha electronic piano] and Brünnhilda [the red VW Bug]). One memorable exception to the alliteration was a miniature rose given (up for dead) to Diana by Winnie in the late 1990s. That one, once Diana brought it back “from the brink,” she named Lazarus. She especially enjoyed the two sound-alike sentences, “Lazarus arose.” and “Lazarus: a rose.”
The quick story of Alberto is that, for many years, we used to go to the farmer’s market in Menlo Park each Sunday. In late 1995 or early 1996 the guy who used to sell the avocados Diana liked had a sign saying that the following Sunday was to be the final one because his wife and he were moving out of state and their kids and grandchildren hated avocado and wanted to plant something more profitable.
Diana bought 18 avocados the following Sunday, made sandwiches, guacamole and everything else imaginable (for us, our friends and neighbors) so as to have all 18 seeds. Each one she planted in a separate (empty — D~U~H) coffee tin. Of the 18, only one had a small green shoot protrude.
Over the next year she put it into a planter and by the time we moved from our original apartment (about 4 miles away) to our current home, Alberto was about one foot tall. His trunk was about the thickness of an adult human thumb and he had some nice leaves.
Our moving date was 13 February 1997. Diana instructed me, early in the morning, to put the plant in the back seat of Brünnhilda (see attached picture taken a few weeks before the move) so the movers wouldn’t accidentally kill it while handling the book cases, bed and other heavy items. The morning temperature in the VW was ~62ºF. By the afternoon it was in the low 90º range and, by night when she told me to bring the plant and other more delicate items in, it was down to ~65º.
All the leaves had fallen off. Diana pointed to the corner in back of the house where Alberto is currently situated, told me to dig and “plant him there.” Today, he’s about 3 stories high.
Each year fruit starts to show up around September but we wait until November so they can grow larger. By January or February all the fruit that will appear has been harvested by me or, those at the top, the squirrels or crows.
Love to all,
February 2017