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Growing Avocado
Crop Nutrition Advice
Everything you need to know about avocado fertilization, best practice, suitable products, field trials and more
Key factors for growing Avocado (Persea americana)
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Soil: Avocado trees require well-draining soil that is rich in nutrients. They prefer a slightly acidic soil pH of around 6.0 to 6.5.
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Water: Avocado trees need regular watering to grow well. They require deep, infrequent watering rather than frequent shallow watering.
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Avocado trees are specifically sensitivity to heat and drought during flowering and fruit-set. Such stresses may decimate the number of fruits.
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Full sun exposure is beneficial for optimum plant development and yields. Cutting off a limb carrying 25-30% of trees’ volume, once every 4 years is common for this purpose.
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Avocado plantations do best if not exposed to high speed winds and storms, which may shed a large share of the fruits, especially when they are at their final filling stages.
During the first application
During the third application
General Aspects:
Nitrogen
Nitrate is readily dissolved in the soil solution, so it is drawn passively into the plant roots, saving on plant’s energy, and enjoying fast assimilation and nutritional effect. While most soil ammonium is attached to soil clays, making it more difficult to take up. Unlike the situation with ammonium, nitrate uptake by the tree’s roots, does not deprive them of their sugars, so roots’ energy supply is not impaired.It also, Promotes high yields and ensures vegetative growth of the crop, plays a key role in synthesis of proteins, which are directly involved in growth and yield.
Phosphorus
Phosphorus is a central part of nucleic acids (RNA and DNA), it is used in storage and transfer of energy (ATP and ADP). P fertilizer stimulates early growth and root formation, used for nutrient uptake, cell division, metabolism. Generally sufficient in most California soils. Least response by plants takes place in the summer with extensive root systems. Taken up by avocado trees mainly by mycorrhizae. Promotes development of a good root system. A prerequisite for flowering and hence- number and maintenance of fruits. Essential for appropriate energy management in the plant. Enhances cell division.
Potassium
The potassium cation, K+, is the most abundant cation in plant cell’s chloroplasts and cytosol (the liquid matrix surrounding the cell’s organelles), it is very mobile in the plant at all levels: within the cells, within tissues, and in long-distance transport, via the xylem and phloem. It is not located in any specific organ. High K concentrations balance the negative charge of all kinds of organic and inorganic anions, thus, stabilizing and buffering the cytosol’s pH at 7–8, which is the optimum for most enzymatic reactions.
Additionally, K+ and its accompanying anions are a major factor, determining the osmotic potential of the plant’s cells and tissues. Potassium’s high mobility across the plants enables it to become a multi-functional factor in plant metabolism.
Calcium and Magnesium
In subtropical growth conditions, approximately 50% of the total fruit nutrient uptake for Mg occurs during the first year, and 50% gets accumulated during the second growing season. However, in contrast to other nutrients, fruit Ca content follows a single sigmoid curve, i.e.- increasing during the first 5 post-bloom months, and then remains constant until fruit harvest, whenever it takes place.
Nutrients requirements
Nutrients removal by 10 MT of avocado fruit
| Nutrient | Kg | Nutrient | g | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| N | 11 - 41 | B | 401 |
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| K | 20 - 61 | Fe | 47 - 212 |
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| Mg | 4 - 8 | Zn | 45 -156 | |||
| S | 4 - 8 | Cu | 10 - 58 | |||
| P | 2 - 10 | Mn | 9 - 47 | |||
| Ca | 2 - 7 |
*(Calculated on fresh weight basis)
Related Trials
Q&A
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Yes. It was found in the trials that the concentration of fertilizer in the water all season leads to better results in the orchard.
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Nutrient requirements in avocado crops vary mainly with soil and climate conditions, cultivar, and growth stage. Then the 4Rs stewardship, – dose, source, time, place – must be considered to properly supply crops demand at a higher efficiency and to reduce fertilizer lixiviation as well as high environmental impacts caused by nutrient losses.
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In an avocado suffering from iron deficiency, the young leaves will turn yellow while the veins will remain green. In such a case, you should fertilize with iron and prefer a fertilizer with a higher ammonical component.
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Of course it is. Trials done found that avocados have a very nice reaction to phosphorus.
Do you have more questions?
