I sprout avocadoes all the time. My grandmother (in PA) had a HUGE potted avocado tree in her living room, it was a thing of glory. But you are unlikely to ever get fruit from them, as you would need to have both a male and a female tree (and no, i have no idea how to sex a tree) per what I read years ago when I was in San Diego and hoping to get my own little fruit grove in the backyard. Also, the fruit you buy in the store is usually genetically infertile. But they sure are pretty!!!

(and no, i have no idea how to sex a tree)

Flowers = male

Fruit = female

That said, I have no idea how one pollinates an avocado.

So I discovered (no pun intended) that my Discover card was compromised. Someone bought $350 worth of clothes from zara.com.

In addition, three plane tix were purchased from Spirit Airlines. The thing about airline tix is that the passenger name shows up when you buy tix. One person has a ticket for March 1, but somehow I don't think they will be getting to where they want to go.

Discover sent me new cards all of the sudden and I did not realize that they had started a fraud investigation because my name had been compromised.

I just googled and UC Riverside says avocado flowers have both male and female organs. Commercial growers use bees as pollinators because the flowers are actively male at different times than they are actively female (and which is when varies by variety. I probably could have worded that better)

Eta: aw, crap, le nubian. It sounds like Discover is on top of it, I hope this doesn't lead to problems for you.

I like avocados, but they kind of don't like me back. Eat my share, too.

oooh, you can indeed buy avocados online

Flowers = male

Fruit = female

Huh. Now see I'd been told (erin too, seems like) that some trees were male and some were female, but if Jessica is right, then all trees are both. Or is it that all trees have flowers but only females bear fruit?

edited to add: Thanks -t for the Google-fu

I did some more research (it's been years since I hoped to get my own fruiting trees) and it's more a matter than productive trees are a result of grafting, rather than planting a bunch and letting bees and wind sort things out.

eta: not that that answers the question of tree sex, but apparently avocado trees aren't very good at mating. Or have been bred to not be good at mating so people like me will be dependent on grocery stores for creamy green goodness.

Shoot, LeNub, I feel you.

Huh. Now see I'd been told (erin too, seems like) that some trees were male and some were female, but if Jessica is right, then all trees are both. Or is it that all trees have flowers but only females bear fruit?

From Wikipedia, 85% of flowering plants are not only bisexual but hermaphroditic, i.e. their flowers have both male and female parts. Another 5-6% are bisexual, but each individual flower is either male or female. Only 6-7% of flowering plants are dioecious, i.e. each whole plant is entirely male or entirely female.

One noteworthy dioecious example is Amborella, because it diverged from other angiosperms (flowering plants) right at the base of the angiosperm family tree, about 130 million years ago. It's now found only on New Caledonia, which has been isolated for the last 65 million years or so. (This is how I came across it, as I'm currently reading a book about evolution and geographic dispersal patterns.)