Avocado Variety Collection | College of Natural & Agricultural Sciences

sliced avocado on top of whole avocados

Avocado Variety Collection

UC Riverside’s 70-year old avocado breeding programs house one of the most elite germplasm collections of scion and rootstock breeding material in the world.

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Learn about avocados; their history, groups, different shapes and tree heights. Here we have answers to your questions and more!

All About Avocados

Pinkerton Avocados

A resource for researchers, farmers, and backyard growers.

Avocado blossom

water (c) Artem Militonian unsplash

Phenology chart

Phenology (temp image)

Rootstock (c) Thomas Fields unsplash

Avocado Varieties

Want to know about various types of avocados? Want to look through a database of almost 1,000 avocado variety names? Want information on species related to avocados? This is the place.

Latest News

Eric Focht and Mary Lu Arp Arpaia

October 24, 2023

Luna UCR avocado is one of TIME's '2023 best inventions'

A new avocado variety that is the result of decades of painstaking tree breeding by UC Riverside agricultural scientists has been selected as one of TIME's 2023 Best Inventions, the international news outlet announced Tuesday, Oct. 24. This recognition comes...

Mary Lu Arpaia with Avocado

August 14, 2023

A report from the groves:

Mary Lu Arpaia and Eric Focht have bred avocado trees in association with the University of California, Riverside, for decades. In the video below, they describe their quest for a better avocado that resulted in the release this year of...

Luna UCR Avocado (BL516)

UCR releases a new avocado tree to the world marketplace

UCR NEWS - A new avocado variety that’s more than a half-century in the making will soon be available to growers in the world marketplace. It’s called the Luna UCR™ and offers consumers great flavor, a rind that turns a...

Avocado Scion Cultivar BL516

University Of California, Riverside to Release A New Avocado Scion Cultivar ‘BL516’

UCR OFFICE OF TECHNOLOGY PARTNERSHIPS - The University of California, Riverside’s (UCR's) avocado scion breeding program began in the 1950’s and continues today under the guidance of Dr. Mary Lu Arpaia, Professor of Extension, Subtropical Horticulture. It has been a...