Growing an avocado at home: discover the tips to make it grow properly in pots
The fruit of the avocado, a plant native to Central and South America, has been much loved and cultivated since time immemorial, and in the last decade, it has become the object of a worldwide culinary trend that seems truly inexhaustible. This has led to the cultivation of avocados even in countries that did not know of it beforehand, and even in the homes of many, it has come as an exotic plant grown mostly in pots.
In fact, if the conditions it prefers in its natural habitat cannot be approximated, it is always advisable to cultivate avocados in pots in order to protect them from the elements in the most challenging periods of the year. Furthermore, it is fun to start cultivation from the time we eat one: specifically, from the seed / pit inside it!
If you already have an avocado seedling (purchased or grown from a pit), you will need to follow these guidelines:
- Exposure: they do not like direct sunlight for too long because the young leaves are sensitive to light. It is therefore necessary to choose bright spots but filtered from the sun during the hottest hours of the day. So, it's fine for it to catch the morning sun, but not thereafter. Temperatures must not drop below 4 °C (39 °F).
- Soil: the soil must be loose, rich in nutrients and well draining. It is therefore advisable to always put a layer, of two or three fingers in depth, of expanded clay at the bottom of the pot, and then lighten it up with a good quality universal soil with a little peat or a little sand.
- Pots: use terracotta pots and ones which are not excessively large. As the plant grows, you can proceed to repotting it into pots which are one or two sizes larger.
- Irrigation: this plant cannot tolerate stagnant water, therefore it should be watered regularly but only when the soil is almost dried out.
To grow and avocado plant from a pit:
- Clean the pit of all the pulp.
- Insert 3 or 4 toothpicks all around the pit at the same level: these are used to ensure that the pit remains suspended over the opening of a glass jar that you will fill with water.
- Fill a glass jar with water up to a few fingers from the top and place the pit with the toothpicks over the opening: the water must reach the bottom third of the avocado pit, so adjust the level if necessary.
- Change the water once a week, until the pit begins to crack open and produces roots at the bottom and shoots at the top of it. In ideal conditions, this will take a couple of weeks, but don't give up hope if it doesn't happen in this time frame: sometimes you have to wait up to two months before you get any growth.
- There are those who recommend cutting the stem when it reaches 6 cm in height, so as to make the roots grow stronger and encourage the plant to create new growth at the bottom.
- When the stem that grows from the pit reaches a height of about 15 centimeters, you can move it into a pot large enough to accommodate the plant with all its roots.
Have you ever grown an avocado plant at home?
