Category Archives: Horticulture

Learning why farmers are smarter than us.

Botany is Pseudoscience

We have a habit of planting seeds from fruits and vegetables, and I decided to try this with some avocado seeds. My failed first attempt was to stick the large seed in dirt, water it, and see what happened. Then, somewhat in parallel with this, I stuck a bunch of seeds in a clear vase outside. After several weeks, nothing had happened.

Frustrated my my attempts to figure this out for myself, I decided to employ the geek’s last resort, i.e. reading the manual. The prevailing theory is to puncture the rock-hard seed thrice with some soft toothpicks and then – well, it doesn’t matter what the and then bit is, because this is crazy talk, akin to dissolving titanium with your mind. I attempted a hybridization of the crazy instructions and what my wife recommended. She pointed out that seeds like air, and I was depriving my submerged seeds of all the air, so I now have a seed half-in and half-out of water, which has cracked and split and is otherwise showing no signs of becoming useful.

In the meantime, I discovered that my failed first attempt, which I had stopped watering and had put next to all the other pots that can be used for other plantings, had sprouted and produced a 6-inch-tall avocado plant.

If I didn’t know better, I’d say that there’s a vast online conspiracy to thwart efforts to grow avocado plants from seeds. If you’re searching on methods to grow avocado plants from seeds, follow my easy guide:

  1. Rinse the seed in water.
  2. Stick the seed in some dirt.
  3. Water the dirt once a day for 4 weeks.
  4. Give up.
  5. Neglect the seed.
  6. Enjoy your new avocado plant.