Mervyn & Elsie Maciel wrote; My own experience while still at school in Aldona was that avocados didn't do well in our Goa climate. Let me explain - my maternal grandfather(ex Zanzibar) had an avocado plant(at our Moira house) which he had grown, presumably from seed/s he had brought back from Zanzibar. The plant had grown into a huge tree but we rarely saw any fruit on it. He often told us about how delicious this fruit was(I'd never even seen one then!), but it had to be many years later that I enjoyed 'king-size avocados especially at Kisii in Kenya and also at my in-laws in Kitale(Kenya).
Maybe there's someone in Goa who can come up with a more positive story? ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Mervyn(M) Only a few types of avocado species can self pollinate. Secondly, most trees bear fruit only every second year. Commercial farms in the US today use grafting and hybrids to make sure that the trees bear fruit every year. There used to be some really large avocado trees at a school in Arusha, Tanzania that had the biggest pears I have ever seen. I never got to taste them though. My wife's birthplace is just a few miles from the Mexican border and center for growing/marketing avocadoes. There used to be a time when the Mexican authorities would search every border-crosser for avocadoes. If one was found, the customs official would cut open the fruit, remove the seed, and let the traveler carry on with only with the flesh. Such was the desire to protect this crop. Lastly, my grand-mom had a medium sized tree in her compound in Colvale. I never saw fruit on that tree but maybe that was because I have only been to Goa in winter. Mervyn2020
