There’s no doubt that slugs and snails help to clean up garden debris. Almost all common garden snails and slugs (except the uniquely destructive Field Slug Deroceras reticulatum), prefer dead garden detritus to living plants. Their feces make a nitrogen-rich, mineral-laden fertilizer that enhances plant nutrition.

Slugs and snails are terrestrial (land) mollusks, related to clams and shellfish. Outside the garden, slugs and snails actually do beneficial things. They recycle organic matter helping to build soils and they are important prey for other wildlife.

Earthworms need the food and habitat provided by surface residue, and they eat the fungi that become more common in no-till soils. As earthworm populations increase, they pull more and more residue into their burrows, helping to mix organic matter into the soil, improving soil structure and water infiltration.

However, they are very important to the environment. Earthworms enrich and improve the soil not for just plants, but animals and humans, too. By tunneling and burrowing they aerate the soil allowing air, nutrients and water to flow deeper into the soil.

Yes, avocados can get worms but that’s very unlikely. This is a very precious crop and farmers do their best to keep it free of pests and diseases. To answer your question avocados (if they ever get worms) have two pests: amorbia moth larvae, fairly big and whitish-yellow.

The brown part of an avocado might look unappetizing and can taste bitter, but it’s still safe to eat. You’d have to leave an avocado out for a few days before it spoiled from oxidation.

Avocados with brown or black spots – often called flesh discolorations – occurs when the avocado has been exposed to cold temperatures for a long period of time before it begins the ripening process. Flesh bruising can occur in transit or as a result of compression caused by excessive handling.

Strings or stringy fruit or the thickening of the vascular bundles (fibers that run longitudinally through the fruit) are generally the result of fruit from younger trees or improper storage conditions. Flesh discoloration can occur when the avocado has been exposed to cold temperatures for a long period of time.

Over the past six months avocados have become good for almost everyone, because it’s been a dry six months and avocados contain a lot of moisture,” Niazov says. However, she adds, they’re not suitable at all for cancer patients, because the avocado’s moisture comes from a very fatty and heavy source.

Avoid avocados that feel mushy or have dents and dips in the skin. Once ripe, eat the avocado in the next day or two, or store it whole and uncut in the refrigerator for up to three days. Cold slows down ripening, so don’t buy unripe avocados and put them in the refrigerator. They won’t ripen properly, if at all.

What is it? Hard lumps or ‘stones’ form in the flesh adjacent to the skin. These ‘stones’, which can be up to 5mm diameter, usually stick to the skin when the avocado is peeled, but are not harmful if eaten. Dark spots or holes can also sometimes be seen on the outside of the fruit.

Avocados are rotten if they’re mushy when squeezed, brown or moldy inside, and have developed rancidity or a sour smell. You may be able to salvage part of the fruit if it’s just starting to brown inside and the rest of the fruit looks, smells, and tastes fine.

The avocado seed is encased in a hard shell and comprises 13–18% of the size of the whole fruit (1). Information about its composition is limited, but it does contain a good range of fatty acids, dietary fiber, carbs and a small amount of protein (2, 3 , 4 , 5 ).

If you come across a variation of avocado that contains a remarkably smaller pit seed than what you’re used to, Crane says, this is also due to a scientific term known as metaxenia. “Metaxenia has to do with pollen’s influence on the physical attributes of the fruit,” Crane says.

Their potential health benefits include improving digestion, decreasing risk of depression, and protection against cancer. Also known as an alligator pear or butter fruit, the versatile avocado is the only fruit that provides a substantial amount of healthy monounsaturated fatty acids (MUFA).

Even so, the seed is actually the most nutrient dense part of an avocado and it’s completely edible.

• Make Dye. Use both the skins and the pit to create a natural pink-hued dye for fabric.
• Save Your Guacamole. Keep your guacamole from going brown by putting an avocado pit in the dip.
• Whip up a Facial Mask. Treehugger / Sanja Kostic.
• Eat It. Treehugger / Sanja Kostic.
• Make Tea.
• Make Mole Sauce.
• Grow an Avocado Plant.
• Be Creative.

You can put the avocado pit into the compost pile as well if it is a dark or hot pile. However it may take even longer to decompose than the rinds.

If you’re really watching your weight, Cucuzza says, it’s probably wise to stick to about one-half to one whole avocado per day, assuming you are also eating other sources of healthy fats. Avocados are also a higher FODMAP food, meaning they contain carbohydrates that may not be digested or absorbed well.

For ripe avocados, the outer skin or peel is easy to remove. If some of the darker almost black portions of the skin remain on the green flesh of the fruit, simply cut them away. The yellow to green portions of the avocado are what you want. Do not consume the peel.