The Unbelievable Fruit Set of 2026

Added: 2026-05-12

[00:00:02]Well, it's one of my most favorite times of year.

[00:00:09]Late spring when I can see how well we're going to do with our fruit set on our avocado trees.

[00:00:17]Look at this thing. Oh my gosh.

[00:00:20]Look at this thing.

[00:00:22]Woah.

[00:00:28]Going to be a big year, people.

[00:00:31]In the year of our Lord 2026 it's going to be a big, big, big fruit set year is my prediction.

[00:00:42]Um so what what uh influences fruit set?

[00:00:49]All kinds of things, but um let me tell you about a few. I'm always trying to completely make my property pristine.

[00:00:56]How did that get here?

[00:00:58]Uh anyway, what influences fruit set on avocados?

[00:01:03]Whole bunch of things.

[00:01:05]Mhm.

[00:01:05]So, here's my theory, okay? Like we're having a huge fruit this fruit set this year. So, it's mainly weather, right?

[00:01:14]Weather uh influences the fruit set.

[00:01:17]Here is that's a little 'cado right there. Beautiful tree.

[00:01:21]Look how dense that is.

[00:01:22]Thing makes so many avocados, it's going to blow your mind. There's an avocado hanging out that the deer exposed by eating all the leaves.

[00:01:30]That's uh from last May. There's even a whole bunch in there from the previous May. So, now I have three crops. I have one that's super rich cuz it's been on the tree for so long, it's got a ton of fat.

[00:01:42]And uh I've got the next crop right there that's probably just getting ready to eat. It's like going to be a little bit bland cuz it doesn't have nearly as much Ooh.

[00:01:53]Okay.

[00:01:54]Um and then I've got the new crop coming on, just sitting on there like little little peas on a in a pod, little pea-size avocados. All right, I just I don't know if you saw my other video, but >> [snorts] >> had a little setback with my knee. Um I got giant gash. Wasn't from a shark even though I'm trying to put that out there.

[00:02:15]Everybody else is telling them it's a shark bite. Um it's way sexy. Here is my What's the other one here?

[00:02:23]This is uh the ball.

[00:02:26]The ball and they always set fruit first on the very top. There's a whole bunch of fruit up there I can see setting. This one sets fruit later. So, down here uh the lower part of the tree for whatever reason lower parts of trees just don't set as fast. But uh there's one sitting right there.

[00:02:43]But there's definitely Here's one. I'll show you a close-up.

[00:02:47]Right there. See?

[00:02:50]So, there's a whole just it's a a boatload. There's a boatload of avocados setting.

[00:02:55]And as far as my Mexicola Grande Yep, same thing. Totally consistent.

[00:03:02]Okay, this tree here is setting more than it's ever set this year.

[00:03:07]This is a Fuerte.

[00:03:10]And there's still an avocado right there. In fact, I think I'll pick that.

[00:03:13]I could use that. Whoa, My knee's messed. I can't can't be rolling down the hill right now.

[00:03:20]It's hard to walk on the hill with a That happened yesterday.

[00:03:23]>> [laughter] >> It was deep. Went all the way to the bone.

[00:03:28]Oh, there's one here.

[00:03:30]>> [clears throat] >> And there's one over here. I'm going to Should I risk it?

[00:03:35]This is I can't I need to walk backwards cuz I can't bend my leg.

[00:03:41]So, that leg needs to be straight on the lower hill.

[00:03:45]Don't [snorts] tell the doctor I'm out here picking avocados on a super steep hill.

[00:03:49]Ah!

[00:03:50]Got it. All right. Look at that. WOW!

[00:03:54]HOHOHO!

[00:03:55]>> [laughter] >> WOW!

[00:03:57]YES. This actually works out pretty well. Look, I can keep this leg straight. This leg can stay bent.

[00:04:02]No problem. I can do this all damn day.

[00:04:06]Uh Wow, look at that avocado.

[00:04:11]Almost looks like an orange. Oh, wait, that's an orange.

[00:04:13]This thing rolled all the way down from across the road.

[00:04:16]Take that home, too. All right, what else do we have here?

[00:04:19]Here's a hash tree that's just been >> [laughter] >> sitting here for 25 years.

[00:04:25]And uh well, didn't have water for like 10. I just got water to it, but look, this thing's never set fruit before.

[00:04:32]It's been struggling.

[00:04:34]And uh but look, there's a whole bunch of fruit this year.

[00:04:38]So, this tells you that these avocados are extremely patient. They can sit there and sit there and sit there and not get any water, and I finally hooked up a little water to it.

[00:04:45]Look, it's going crazy.

[00:04:47]All right.

[00:04:49]Who here likes bacon?

[00:04:53]You guys like bacon? Come on, everybody likes bacon.

[00:04:56]Here it is.

[00:04:57]Here's some bacon.

[00:04:59]Look at the bacon. Are you following suit and having a huge avocado apocalypse fruit set? Right, you are, just like everybody else.

[00:05:07]Yep.

[00:05:08]Why do I call it an avocado apocalypse?

[00:05:10]Well, because um God, I might be able to get to those trees, so I have to walk backwards.

[00:05:18]Um how's that going to work? Anyway, let me think about it. All right, so I want to show you more trees, but God, dedicated I am.

[00:05:26]>> [laughter] >> I'm out here with the freaking giant wound showing you my trees.

[00:05:31]I have to walk backwards.

[00:05:33]I think I will.

[00:05:35]All right, so uh what was I about to say?

[00:05:40]This is going to be difficult walking backwards through the thorns.

[00:05:43]Yeah.

[00:05:45]Uh no problem.

[00:05:47]No problem.

[00:05:48]Um Yeah, so it's an avocado apocalypse because when avocados set too much fruit they um all the energy goes to the fruit and the tree suffers.

[00:06:05]So, here's something bucking the trend.

[00:06:08]This, my friends, is a daily 11.

[00:06:11]Giant, huge avocado. We're going to start selling this one.

[00:06:14]>> [snorts] >> We got some propagated.

[00:06:17]But, I don't see any new fruit on this thing. Not a single one.

[00:06:22]I don't see any flowers.

[00:06:24]I see a couple flowers and no fruit up there.

[00:06:27]But, this thing hit set really heavily this year. In fact, it set a lot more than you see. And the reason you don't see any is I had a bunch of Mexican dudes working over here and I told them, "Do not pick this fruit."

[00:06:37]You know what was weird? When they left there was only like a third of the fruit on these trees after they left. Despite me giving them a whole bunch of Zutano fruit and a bunch of other stuff. I said, "These avocados are not ready.

[00:06:49]They're not going to be ready until June." So, they totally wasted my avocados.

[00:06:53]I mean, good guys. They worked really hard. You know what?

[00:06:56]Don't be raiding a brother's tree.

[00:06:59]Look at that thing. Huge.

[00:07:02]Uh Oh, there's a giant fat one up there.

[00:07:06]That's a fat fat fat, slightly deformed fruit. Anyway, I don't see any fruit at all. So, this one's bucking the trend.

[00:07:13]No fruit for next year on That's all right, cuz we want, you know alternating is good because it's why you get multiple trees from yours truly because Ah.

[00:07:23]Ah.

[00:07:24]Ah.

[00:07:25]Ah.

[00:07:26]Here we go.

[00:07:28]Here we go.

[00:07:29]Um That way you get uh multiple trees. That way you're always guaranteed some avocados every single year.

[00:07:37]Mr. Zutano, how are we doing today?

[00:07:39]You going to set some fruit this year?

[00:07:41]Heck yeah, you are. You have a lot this year.

[00:07:43]This thing was pretty light.

[00:07:45]Still had a fair amount, like enough for me.

[00:07:48]Not enough to sell.

[00:07:49]But, um there's probably still some on it.

[00:07:52]I need to get it if there is some. It's hard to see though.

[00:07:56]They like to hide it. Oh, there's one.

[00:07:59]There's one right there. These things are delicious. A lot of people say, "Oh, they're tart and they're full of water."

[00:08:04]And I'm like, "No, full of cream." These things are gorg- gorgeous and delicious. So, I love them.

[00:08:11]It's like a lighter um avocado that's creamier.

[00:08:16]I love it.

[00:08:18]It's got one of the most beautiful leaves of all the avocados.

[00:08:20]All right. Oh, this is really hard to do. Backwards is just easier.

[00:08:26]Okay.

[00:08:27]Um >> [snorts] >> Look at all the fruit.

[00:08:30]Look at this.

[00:08:31]Crazy amount of fruit.

[00:08:34]Okay.

[00:08:36]And here we have Mr. Jim Bacon.

[00:08:40]Look at you.

[00:08:42]We didn't have a lot on this tree this year.

[00:08:44]But, they were really good, the ones we had.

[00:08:46]This is the one that ripens up red right on Valentine's Day, so you can give it to your girl.

[00:08:51]Okay, so have I demonstrated to you that we're having a fantastic fruit set? I got a little Lamb Hass over here.

[00:08:57]Should we check it?

[00:08:59]Why not? Let's go.

[00:09:01]It's It's like really annoying to have to walk backwards.

[00:09:04]I even have some Guatemaltecado out here. I planted all over the hill, the big giant one.

[00:09:09]They had a sheep They had the middle of winter though, and they kind of set back [clears throat] a little bit. But, look at it.

[00:09:14]See that?

[00:09:15]Like, the whole top died.

[00:09:17]Now, the bottom's coming out, no problem. It'll be fine. But, I have to keep up with the white wash on it. But, some of these Guatemaltecados I saw were already setting fruit at that young age, but I'm probably going to cut those off.

[00:09:27]How's my guac or my Lamb Hass doing? He's just out getting We still not getting Oh, no, there's a drip line. We put in drip this year.

[00:09:36]Uh from the old drip system that deer destroyed.

[00:09:39]So, there's a fruit I'm going to pick back in there.

[00:09:43]Um, so, look, even on old trees they can get totally sunburned and, uh, not be happy for that branch, but that branch protects everything else below it. So, when they get big enough it doesn't really matter about the sunburn.

[00:09:56]You can see the sunburn there, it's black on top, green on the bottom. If it was really painted well, that wouldn't happen.

[00:10:03]Yeah, that's pretty black on the tree.

[00:10:05]And, uh, but anyway, there's very little fruit this year. That's all right, I want you to grow.

[00:10:09]It's finally getting water after being neglected for so long.

[00:10:12]And that's another Bacon.

[00:10:14]I'm seeing a lot of fruit on that one.

[00:10:17]Another Bacon over there.

[00:10:19]Didn't get water for a long time. What's growing? I can see fruit on that one.

[00:10:23]Maybe we'll go up there on the way out.

[00:10:25]Uh, take one last look at Look at all of Did I just kick the drip line?

[00:10:31]Just like a deer would do. I did.

[00:10:33]Oh, no.

[00:10:35]Now I have to find the dripping emitter.

[00:10:37]You can't even see it. All right, you're just going to get some extra water right here for a little while till I come back.

[00:10:43]Um, what affects the fruit set?

[00:10:47]Want to hear my theory?

[00:10:50]What happened this year?

[00:10:52]Well, one, we had a lighter fruit set last year, that kind of helped.

[00:10:55]Um, like this Guacacado, he's taking off over here.

[00:10:59]Ooh, you're going to be a happy This is an aggressive tree, people. Guacacado, the one biggest largest fruit of avocado California.

[00:11:08]I found this thing growing near my nursery. Spent a bunch of time researching it, evaluating it, trialing it, and ultimately patented it.

[00:11:17]I bought the rights from, uh, the property owners and they were delighted because, you know, I even buy all their fruit.

[00:11:25]And we're good buddies now.

[00:11:27]Anyway, so that's a good one you want to add to your collection. But, uh, even this sad I'm thinking about stumping this tree back and getting it brand new again.

[00:11:35]Um but even this one is setting a bunch of fruit.

[00:11:39]Just baking here.

[00:11:41]What affects heavy fruit set? Let's talk about that. All right, so it's my theory that [snorts] uh heavy fruit set comes from years like we had this year.

[00:11:51]What do we have this year?

[00:11:53]We had a just a crazy winter.

[00:11:57]And I believe March, which is still technically winter, all of March was like summer, like hot.

[00:12:03]And uh and it was I think it was really dry dry in January, wet in February, and then extremely hot in March followed by heavy rains in April, and then uh rather cool uh temperatures now. We haven't had any extremes in the last you know, 3 4 weeks.

[00:12:23]So, what does that do? Think about that.

[00:12:24]So, when the early uh heat came like in March, I believe, I mean it was like 90° out here. It was crazy. For like a month.

[00:12:33]That brought all the bees out like in a huge way.

[00:12:36]Pushed all the flowers out.

[00:12:38]Bees went crazy. Thought it was springtime.

[00:12:41]And then they all, you know, flowered and set fruit. I'll take that one.

[00:12:46]And then uh but then oftentimes what happens is you have a big heat wave usually like in May or June or even in April. We didn't have that, right? When the right when the avocados are setting on the tree.

[00:12:59]And that induces a whole bunch of stress on the tree and all the not all, but many of the avocados will drop.

[00:13:05]Okay?

[00:13:07]It was the opposite this year. It was very cool. And so all the avocados were on the tree setting as in right now. We have this forecast for 14 days. It's just like in the 60s and low 70s, which is perfect to set a lot of fruit except I think it's too perfect. I think it's going to set too much fruit. It's going to stress the trees out this year.

[00:13:23]But we're going to get a lot of fruit.

[00:13:26]But uh anyway, so yeah, what do you want? What are you hoping for?

[00:13:31]We're hoping for Look, here's the old drip system.

[00:13:34]That one, and then we converted it, and now we're rolling again. There's the old one. Just going to leave it there, I think.

[00:13:41]Look at Oh my god.

[00:13:44]Oh my god.

[00:13:46]This is Jim Bacon over here. I mean, what are you going to do? This This is way too much fruit. There's no way you could sit here and thin all this fruit out. There are thousands of fruit that are setting in a big way. Usually they drop by now. Now they're at a size where they typically don't drop.

[00:14:01]This is the heaviest fruit I've ever seen on Jim Bacon.

[00:14:04]It's actually a little scary.

[00:14:06]It's like a 9-year-old girl getting pregnant with like quintuplets.

[00:14:12]It's not a big tree, and it's got a lot of fruit on it. It's a lot of fruit to support.

[00:14:16]Not a good idea, but anyway, it's happening. So, um Anyway, uh yeah, you want your uh Ideally, if you want to wreak heavy fruit set, you want to like some really warm weather at time of flowering.

[00:14:28]Really warm and hot, even hot is good.

[00:14:31]Get the bees out.

[00:14:33]Then, right after that, you want it to cool down a little bit.

[00:14:36]Maybe get a little bit of rain, so these things aren't drought stressed.

[00:14:40]And then, they'll just hold on to all their fruit in a big way, like they did this year. So, this is the uh avocado guacapocalypse.

[00:14:50]Avocado-apocalypse heavy fruit set.

[00:14:52]Hopefully it won't hurt the trees too bad to have this much fruit. But, I think it might a little.

[00:14:57]Of 2026, in the year of our Lord 2026. I just like saying that, you know, sounds kind of cool. All right, guys, that's it, and I hope you get as much fruit on your trees as I got on mine this year.