Avocado 01

Owing to later suburban sprawl in Southern California, the mother tree stood for many years in front of a residence in La Habra Heights

Brokaw then specialized in the Hass and often sold out of grafted seedlings since, unlike the Fuerte, Hass yields are year-round and also more plentiful, with bigger fruit, a longer shelf life and richer flavor owing to higher oil content

As the tree's yields grew bigger, Hass easily sold what his family did not eat to co-workers at the post office.

Hass thought of cutting it down but a professional grafter named Caulkins told him the young tree was sound and strong, so he let it be.

After trying and failing at least twice to graft the seedling with branches from Fuerte avocado trees

At the time, Rideout was getting seeds from any source he could find, even restaurant food scraps.