How can I reuse or recycle … fruit “stones”?
We went out for a Mexican meal the other day (mmm, mexican food) and while eating a giant pile of guacamole (mmm, guacamole), we had one of those wonderings about what must happen to the many, many leftover avocado stones. From that, our wonderings went onto other fruit stones – plums, peaches etc.
Obviously, they can be planted to grow a new fruit plant or composted (although they’d take a good while to break down) but aside from that, are there any fun ways to use them?
Avocado stones are usually beautifully smooth so could they be made into (GIANT) beads? Any other suggestions?
(Photo by tpacific)
I saw an artist selling pendants that were made out of slices of avocado pits once… he’d taken a slice of the pit, carved a design into the flat side and then dried it – they were gorgeous.
I worked in the kitchen at a summer camp a few years back. Avocados were a regular feature at our meals and people started to carve little bugs out of the halves of each stone. Someone made me a little box, too small to hold anything, but nice none the less.
I have grown many of them as house plants in a container of water and planted many of them outdoors later. Poke tooth picks near the big end (3 or 4)and suspend in the top of a glass of water till a little above half way up the seed Takes a while, but the seed will split and eventually put out a root. Keep topped off with water. Have to have a male and female plant to make more fruit, so plant a bunch outside.
Here is one suggestion from a website..
Avocado pits are dried then grated with a fine grater and used in enchilada sauce. This is a traditional ingredient in parts of Northern Mexico. Don’t use too much or you will make the sauce bitter.
You could varnish them with clear nail polish, or something that is greener (as in enviro-friendly, not the shade) and put them in a glass vase when you have enough. You could mix them up with conkers or snail shells or sea shells etc. Nigello
I found that any fruit stones that are nice and shiny go dry and wrinkly after a while, so they are not that pretty anymore.. So no point varnishing them.. If anyone knows a way to keep them smooth – it would be great!
With enough varnish you can prevent it from drying out. getter yet use an epoxy resin varnish.
I’m a big recycler and gardener. I like all of the suggestions for decorative use of fruit stones, but I should let you know that most fruit seeds produce inferior fruit trees – if you want edible fruit, buy fruit plants or make cuttings from existing trees. You can grow from seed, just don’t expect good fruit from it.
Here’s an idea for avocado stones: dye them near-black with tannin (you can boil acorns for this – eat the acorns and then soak the stones in the tannin-water). Then use a saw to cut off the bottom and top thirds of the stone. Hollow out the top, and you have a stylish, natural candle holder.
How about drying them and using them as juggling “balls?”
how about you just throw them out and they eventually decompose because they are organic and quit losing sleep?
I recommend composting the pits. This is the best way to recycle organic matter in that it returns to the earth and cycles through new organisms which feed on the nutrients. A good, hot compost pile or worm bin will be able to break down an avocado pit.
I’m with Ethan. My fruit pits all go into the compost heap. It’s true that the outer shells of, say, peach pits may remain intact long after everything else has broken down, but no harm there!
Whenever I put them in the heap, they sprout. Or at least they have a better chance of success than the other methods I’ve tried. The toothpick thing just makes them turn to rot in my house. I think that the warm temperature, combined with the constant moisture, may be the real trick. I read that somewhere. They take quite a while to break down, anyway.
Sounds to me as if the stones are pretty useless really. Let’s start another string about what to do with all that avocado skin that you get as well!
Compost them and have done with it. Actually they really do sprout well in the compost bin!
Keep a few of the smooth stones (eg avocado) for use a massage tools
I use the peach pits to make peach seed angels and sell them at craft shows…..I make a head of sculpy clay…I used the peach seed as the body …I drill a hole in the body to hold the wire that I run thru the head to hold them together. Before baking the heads with wire thru them….make an indentation for the mouth (like an angel singing)….Then I combine them (having already painted the body (seed) with 3-6 coats of pearl fingernail polish…..I glue some type of wing on back (ultra-suede, ribbon, wire, etc) ….and I use some pretty yarn for hair…(can curl the yarn by wrapping around a 7-12 inch piece of clothes hanger, wetting it and baking on 200 for a couple of hours) …. also can add a halo of pearls or gold tiny tinsel…..I make as pins or necklaces…..Can do all of this for ornaments too……
Walnuts- I opened up the green pulp, soaked the black walnuts in a bucket, let it sit in the cold cellar, removed the walnuts with a slotted spoon, set aside to dry and crack. I kept the “walnut bath” and put the black liquid in old honey jars. I have had this walnut black stain for years. It has never spoiled. I use it on old household woodwork, stain for my art projects
Pet toy.
Avocado leaves, fruit, seeds and bark contain a chemical that is toxic to Dogs.
Turn into beads for your garden’s scare crow.
Turn wild field into an avocado orchard.
I say eat them – see comment above re. Mexicans using a bit shaved up to add to guacemole to give it a bitter taste. Sometimes bitter is good; maybe there’s antioxidants there which could be good against cancer. Any old wife’s tales?
Avo stones I’ve best seen in the compost heap, bringing inspiration to a rotting world.
I just tried slicing the brown skin off, to look at (and taste the bitterness) only to find in minutes the creamy nut had turned bright orange1 I guess the oxidisation is the net result of bitter chemicals inside guarding the seed.
I guess i’ll toss it into my burner and see how it gets on now.
How about recycling into skin care products such as scrubs ?