Sharwil Avocados - Abundant 2021 Harvest! 🥑 👍

In mid-June Rancho Aloha finished its 2021 harvest season of Sharwil Avocados. During the 5 and ½ month season a record 5,225 pounds of Rancho Aloha avocados were picked and marketed. The year’s abundance is attributable in part to a season of generous rainfall and in part to an “up year” in the orchard’s general two-year cycle.

Roughly 60% of the farm’s crop was sold to Kane Plantations, Kona’s only avocado packer certified by the USDA for shipping Sharwils to the northern tier states on the US mainland between November 1 and March 31 each year. Although the mainland market is expanding, a majority of exported Hawaii Sharwils are currently shipped by air from Kona to Seattle. If you live in the Seattle area, look for Sharwils at Metropolitan Markets and other specialty outlets beginning in November.

The remaining 40% of the crop was sold at the Rancho Aloha booth at the Saturday Keauhou Farmers Market in South Kona — to a strongly loyal group of Sharwil appreciators. While recognizing that taste is subjective, it should be noted that a sign on the booth’s basket of avocados reads, “Hawaii Sharwils—The World’s Best Avocados”. Subjective perhaps, but it is true. 😃

By complete happenstance, on June 12 the very last Rancho Aloha avocado of the season was purchased at the Farmers Market by Karen Kemp. For 10 years Karen rented the cottage in the middle of Rancho Aloha’s coffee and avocado orchard where she taught Geographic Information Science over the internet from the cottage’s lanai to graduate students at the University of Southern California.