Jim Bacon, Hass and Lamb Hass Avocado Fruit Tasting.AVI

In this late December avocado fruit review we look at 3 different avocado fruit; Jim Bacon an "B" flower type avocado tree and very cold tolerant, Hass, an "A" flower type and not very cold tolerant and Lamb Hass, an "A" flower type and not very cold tolerant either. Finding good tasting and meaty "B" flower type fruit is not always that easy. The "B" flower types, other than Sir Prize Hass, are not always that appealing to people. Fuerte is one of the best "B" flower type fruit and a solid performer in colder climates, but people are often turned off by the strong flavor of the Fuerte fruit.
Jim Bacon was once in large scale production in Southern California, older trees dating back at least 50 years can be found in pockets of the Southern Calfornia foothills. On a recent delivery and planting in Sierra Madre my customer there had several old Jim Bacon Avocado trees and said the fruit was among the best he had ever tasted. I took some of his fruit and compare here with the first harvest of the new Jim Bacon trees in my area.
I also purchased some Lamb Hass fruit from a Fallbrook fruit stand and compare the Lamb Hass with the Jim Bacon and the regular Hass for texture, basic flavor and oil content in a totally unscientific and personally biased approach. Obviously I was expecting great qualities from the Lamb Hass, but I have to give the old line Jim Bacon a big thumbs up. Jim Bacon does not have the watery texture of regular Bacon, it was very creamy and smooth in tast. The fruit is also smaller in size to Bacon. In colder climates I would be very much in favor of planting Jim Bacon pollinated by Mexicola for a solid winter harvest of quality avocado fruit.

[@iDONTdoFacebook]

I’ll be 61 years old in a few weeks. I live in Arkansas today. Came here in late 1969 when I was 10. I’ll share a memory with you... From 1961 up until November of 1969 (my age 2 - 10) if you walked out the front door of our home and looked left 2 houses down to the open end of our quiet little culdesac, across the street there and over the top of the houses you could see the deep-green leafy tops of a shady grove of mature trees that bordered that side of our neighborhood. It was the only “woods” for miles around as the big city had, by the time I came on the scene in the 60’s, grown up around that grove leaving it an isolated island out of time and place for a young city boy. That quiet, shady grove was a veritable “forest” in my young eyes and I was a young “Lewis & Clark” at heart and could not resist the compulsion “to explore strange new worlds -to seek out new life and new civilizations -to boldly go where no kid had gone before”. The “woods” behind the houses at the end of our street were a MAGNET to this then-young boy and I was drawn in by the promise of adventure that always accompanies exploration. A couple of times, beginning at about age 7, I organized parties of exploration, recruiting similarly youthful volunteers from the neighborhood to enter the forest with me. I remember one sunny morning leading a party of about 6 or 7 of us in. Over the back block wall of someone’s back yard we went like Special Ops, slipping quietly and cautiously into the cool and musty-smelling shadows of “The Forest”. We slowly made our way thru, a couple of us periodically climbing up into the sturdy trees as “lookouts” for any incoming “danger” and to get a better view of what might lie up ahead so we could better plot our course -or quickly escape if we needed to. Well I guess we needed more Special Ops training because 6 or 7 highly excited 6 to 8 year-old boys can’t match real Special Ops furtiveness. We had made enough noise that we attracted the attention of the Master of The Forest who tracked us down and caught up to us as we were trying to help little 6 year-old Timmy Carson get over the block wall so we could make our escape. Most of us had already hopped the wall and were home free when we heard little Timmy bawling and screaming for someone to help him get over the wall and that “the man” was going to get him and was almost there. Being “professional” explorers rather than just a bunch of scared neighborhood kids, we had real loyalty to one another and wouldn’t leave the smallest and youngest of our party to be captured or slaughtered so we climbed back over that block wall and as the man approached, dry leaves crunching under each of his steps, we started boosting Timmy up. Timmy had just mounted the top of the wall when the man arrived. He was tall, kind of old (compared to us anyway), wore old-timey-looking thick-glass eyeglasses, and instead of yanking us up, slaughtering us, or yelling at us, he just nicely asked us what we were doing and stated that his main concern was us getting hurt on his property. He turned out to be a nice neighbor and upon our getting ‘caught’ again on a later excursion into “the forest” he gave us a tour of his property that included the old home he and his wife lived in, an old barn, some sheds, and a really old 2-story building standing silently in the shade of some big trees that grew all around it. The latter looked like it had been used as a shop over the past few decades but more recently to just store old seldom used tools or farm equipment (I’ve more recently learned thru some historical research that that old 2-story was the oldest building in the entire city). It was dim in the old building that morning with the only light coming in thru a couple of windows. I well remember the dust motes floating aimlessly in the ambient light as I took in the ancient atmosphere and the old oily smell of the place. I remember the man pointing at the old broken wooden stairs to our left in the front corner of the building and telling us the story of how those stairs and that corner of the building came to be seriously damaged. And damaged they were. There was a section of the stairs that was busted up and some of its steps just hanging. And the wall itself was shattered there to the point that you could see outside. The man told us that many decades ago there was a team of horses hooked up to a wagon and the horses had spooked and took off without anyone on the wagon to control them. As the team ran past that corner of the building pulling the wagon, the wagon slid sideways slamming into the building nearly taking out that corner. So why am I sharing all this here? Our neighborhood “forest” was an avocado orchard and “the man” was indeed the Master of that place. It was Buena Park of Orange County California in the 1960’s and the man was none other than James “Jim” Bacon, developer of the frost tolerant Bacon Avocado. Mr. Bacon was my neighbor and his old avocado orchard was my “forest” -a special playground of my youth. Those old sturdy trees I climbed were THE ORIGINAL Bacon Avocado trees from which all other Bacon trees descend. I went back in there several times. And got caught a couple more times. But each time we did get caught Mr. Bacon took the time to make something special out of these surprise visits. One time when it was just my little brother and me, Mr. Bacon put a ladder up against a shed that had a large golden plum tree growing up against it and sent us up to pick a bunch to bring home with us. Those were the sweetest most magnificent tasting plums I’ve ever eaten to this day. After getting our plums picked and a little more conversation with him, Mr. Bacon loaded us into his car and gave us a ride home. On another occasion he took us in his home to meet Mrs. Bacon. She had just baked some cookies and sat us down with a glass of milk and a couple of cookies each and we got to have a nice visit with her. About 2 years later I was happy to find that I’d been assigned to Mrs. Bacon’s 5th Grade class at Dysinger Elementary School. But I only had her for half the school year as that was the year that we moved from Buena Park to Arkansas in November of 1969. Some years later on a trip back to the old Buena Park neighborhood I was DEVASTATED to find the old Bacon home, barn, sheds, the old 2-story building, all gone. And with them, all those special trees - my beloved avocado “forest” - and Mr and Mrs. Bacon. All...gone. Everything had been leveled to the ground to make way for “progress” and development. What was once a magical enchanted place -once a peaceful island of quiet and cool shade under a canopy of deep green, insulated from the city surrounding it, was now a hot asphalt parking lot surrounding a modern hotel which are constantly being assaulted by the neverending noise of Hwy 39’s Beach Blvd. Sacred special memories. Some things ought to last forever. But alas, this is yet a temporal world we live in. We’re still looking forward to when it’s made Eternal and all good things can last. But I do still have those memories of Mr. and Mrs. Bacon and their ‘magical’ mature avocado orchard which I cherish DEARLY. They were warm, wonderful, welcoming people and I miss them.

[@msassi]

He just helped me decide on the pollinator for my Reed avocado!

[@chrisdockwell]

Great info! I didn't know about the A and B flower types.

[@montanarealltyco]

wow, good stuff! definitely interested now in the lamb hass. thanks

[@ChameleonSoul]

My mouth is watering

[@hybrid2003]

Hey Christ, I bought a Lamb Hass from you like a year ago, I live in Long Beach. My fruit was still hard on the tree till March 28. I finally harvested them a week before spring break.

[@burnsloads]

Avocado doesn't ripen on the tree. You have to harvest them to start the ripening, so you could have a fruited tree through winter, lucky.

[@dariollorca1323]

Necesito datos de contacto para adquirir algunos ejemplares de Lamb Hass (certificadas no de semilla) que hagan envios a Argentina. Desde ya gracias

[@JacqDavis]

Thank you so much for the taste review! I recently planted a Jim Bacon and a Holiday. Your video is the only one that reviews the flavor of Jim Bacon. I have two little fruit formed on the tree already so looking forward to see if the tree will hang on to the fruit so I can give it a taste next year.

[@Growquest]

+Jacq Davis Remember regular weekly deep watering is the key to getting fruit from development now to eating quality in the early fall. Always check the soil 6 inches below the surface to make sure it is wet. Any questions just send an email or post a question. - Chris

[@JacqDavis]

Awesome, thank you so much for the tip!

[@SRCDLC]

Great info. Thanks

[@philstat100]

Thank You for the great video and information. I was hoping to hear about the taste on the sirprize avocados. Does a type B tree have flowers that are both male and female? Again Thank You

[@kendallfinch3838]

trying to decide what kind of avo tree to plant and this video was very helpful!

[@thegoldenboy294]

Kendall Finch wich one you planted?

[@Em6726]

Hi Chris, I recently purchased a lamb hass. The tree is approximately 7' tall. I would like to plant it as soon as possible. What soil should I mix in with it and how deep and how wide would I need to dig to plant the tree? What fertilizer should I use and when. I'm located in lemon grove. Any tips? Thanks in advance! Eric

[@MOSKEY13TH]

put condense milk :]

[@mariedelozier2530]

Hey buddy, the only reason you're low-ratin' the Bacons is that you never et one full oil!! Ya gotta be patient, monitor yer trees, watch them pericarps, and even wait till pit-rattle. You never ate better stuff than guac made with them things, the Asians love'em for smoothys and desserts and for me, nothin' better than a perfectly ripe Bacon on the half-shell with a little salt,salsa,or good Eyetalian dressing!!

[@rmorris8942]

Best not to eat while trying to talk to others... for many reasons! Otherwise good information.

[@joemercieca4794]

R Morris lts an avocado tasting video. Best description obtained while actually tasting.