Abundant Avocados

I just had to take a photo of this luscious bunch of avocados from our neighbor's tree that are hanging over our fence. Aren't they gorgeous? The problem is that they are all looks and no substance.

Our properties were once a large avocado orchard before they were subdivided back in the 1930's. Almost everyone on the street still has at least one tree on their slope. We have three, two that still produce wonderful, tasty fruit in abundance almost every other year (avocados produce bumper crops every two or three years and hardly any fruit other years). The trees on our property are fuerte avocados, I've been told, but very tasty and creamy, unlike many of the Florida fuerte avocados that can be bland. I don't know what kind this is on my neighbor's tree, but they do not ripen well (they seem to go straight from hard to rotten) and have a lot of fibers.

Those leaves that are half brown? All avocado trees in this area look like that around this time of year because of the build up of salts in the soil due to a lack of rain the past few years. When the tree is done blooming in about a month, most of these old leaves will fall off creating a thick mulch under the tree. If there is any plant that is happy with all the rain we have been having, it would be the avocado that requires a good soaking to disperse the salts that gather near the surface of the soil where their roots grow.