Avocado variety?

Renate starts with ...
Tasted a wonderful avocado grown on Lord Howe island, so possibly an old variety. It looked like an enormous eggplant with purple skin, the most wonderful creamy and tasty flesh and I think only a small pit. Can anyone identify what variety it might be and where I could find a plant?

Brendan says...
I have one growing here, large, purple skin when ripe, but has a very large seed. Mind you, the creamy tasty flesh can be 25 to 30mm thick! None on this year tho :-( It's a seed-grown avo too.

Mate who gave me it, called it a Proserpine Purple?

Pauline says...
Mmmmm yes, I wonder.

Renate says...
Hi BJ. i looked on your website and the Oro Nero does look similar. Now for the hard question - how do I get one in Australia?

Brendon, your Proserpine Purple sounds interesting...but again, where are these gems available?

Jason says...
Purple skinned Avocados with a more white flesh are the most common type in the mountains of central Mexico, they are the most cold hardy Avocado's. There's not many of those genetics around in Australia, very easy to get in theory. I could have seed sent out from Mexico any day, but customs dodgy restrictions are stopping me.

About large avocados I have seen a very old picture of a large Avocado tree taking in the 1800s in Mexico. The tree had a 5? year old boy standing in front of it and he didn't make much of an impression on the tree, the trunk woud have been in excess of 6 feet wide. I doubt any Avocado tree of that size exists these days but it makes you realise what is possible given enough time and given no humans to break things

Peter says...
Yes, this was before Phytophthora cinnamomi was spread throughout the continents, which highlights the importance of quarantine...

Mike says...
I have reed and hazard and they are fairly standard types.Hawaiin types frowe,masami,ohata, and hayes are large and purple, usually with small skin but I didn't think that they were in Australia.Mexicola is black/purple and small more in the hass style.
Having worked with pest and environmental management I am extremely sceptical about customs and quarantine regulations for pest and disease management at the state and federal levels.Many threats are ignored or not addressed and there is overkill with minor threats.There is much that is non-sensical and baffling and great temptation to flout laws with extraordinary quarantine requirements.By the way I reckon that many phytopthoras (even P.cinnamomi) are native and they can 'activate' with poor drainage and with other bad land management.I also think there are plenty of introduced ones that can't be identified properly and just get called P.citrocola or P.solanami or whatever pretty randomly.

Peter says...
Interesting you mention native Phytophthora's: Recently two new Phytophthora species have been found in the Kwongan vegetation in SW Western Australia which are probably native to the region. Disease impact is periodically only and does not change the species composition of the vegetation - a sign of a long coevolution and therefore is probably endemic. This contrasts with P. cinnamomi in Australia, where this one has caused severe damage to native vegetation. Sometimes we just don't know anymore, how the landscape looked before a particular pest and old pictures make us realise the degradation.
I am only interested to comment on the biological aspect of the topic - certainly there is so much more to discuss about the political/mangement side and shortcomings of the system.
Anyway, as a consequence of plant movement, the number of different Phytophthora's in metropolitan areas is higher than any gardener wishes for.
Good drainage is not sufficient when dealing with P.'s spread by air. Luckily we don't have the air-borne P. ramorum (yet).

Mike says...
I don't think mexicola avos are in Australia yet and like the hawaiin ones I have only seen pictures.I think some of the purples are derived hangovers from when you could bring in seeds and from seedlings of some of the purples and hass groups.They might not then be able to be pinned to named varieties.
P.cinnamomi strains may be native and even play a role maintaining biodiversity like cyclones or crown of thorns starfish by knocking out dominants.Flowing,splashing water can spread spores but dampness and standing water really get it going.There have been baffling P.cinnamomi outbreaks in remote rainforest that are inexplicable but weeds,new vectors and disturbance would be usual catalysts.With fire it is usually good for fuel reduction,habitat improvement and pest reduction.The natural intensity to frequency varies from almost yearly low intensity fires in the north to high intensity fires every 7 or so years in the south.Fire exclusion can set up a big future disaster with fuel build-up but the weather conditions of the burn to minimise risk need to be considered.Development in some places obstructs good management and the wrong intensity or frequency of fires can be harmful in many ways.

Jason says...
Well there you go, now it's up to Phil to go for a visit :D

Brendan says...
Don't forget Phil to bring back some scions for yourself, Jason & me :-)
I'd like mine in April/May thanks.

Phil@Tyalgum says...
Actually the description sounds a lot like Red Wethersfield, an old onion popular in the US in the early 19th century, and the Norfolk Island Red seems to have been brought there by American whalers. Maybe they are one and the same. Still available through current catalogues too.

Pictures - Click to enlarge
Picture: 1

Phil@Tyalgum says...
Thanks Renate - it should be peaceful enough for me to do an inventory of what they are growing there...