Is It OK To Take Avocados And Other Fruits From Your Neighbor's Tree? A Favorite LA Question, Revisited

Editor's note: This story was first published in 2019, and continues to be so popular with readers that we have updated it — just in time for many avocado varieties to come due, and for the upcoming citrus seasons.

Can you pick the fruit off your neighbor's tree if the branch is hanging over your property? Is it more offensive when it's avocados?

Apparently, it depends on who you ask.

But one thing is clear: This question gets asked again and again. Every year.

When our chief content officer posed this question on her own Twitter account, we thought it would be fun to pose the question to you, dear reader — and in the process, help our colleague decide whether to pick the avocados.

Here's some context:

It didn't take long for locals to chime in.

But what does the law say?

Despite the influx of hot takes, the question remains: is it legal to pick fruit from your neighbor's tree?

The general consensus is that if the tree is on public land, the fruit is yours to take, unless you see signage indicating otherwise. If a fruit-bearing branch crosses onto your property, it becomes more of a gray area.

Community Law Center, a Maryland-based nonprofit that delives into the issues of law in a way that laypeople can understand, reasons that in California, it is legally acceptable to take fruit from your neighbor's tree if the tree branches extend over your property line.

FindLaw, a website that aims to "make the law accessible and understandable for everyone," tackles this question by making note of what California defines as grand theft. According to Penal Code 487, it's when "domestic fowls, avocados, olives, citrus or deciduous fruits, other fruits, vegetables, nuts, artichokes, or other farm crops are taken of a value exceeding $250."

But, like, don't steal your neighbor's fruits — especially $250 worth of it.

But the overarching advice we've seen over and over is that perhaps the quickest, easiest way to answer this question is to simply ask your neighbor if you can have some. Who knows, you might even end up making a new friend.

That's the advice offered up by David Burns, co-founder of Fallen Fruit, an art and public spaces collaboration that maps the location of public fruit trees growing on or over public property — and encourages the public to partake of that bounty.

"I think the answer is to be kind. It's a relationship. And your neighbors will mimic you. If you can ask, it's really nice." And more likely than not, the person will be happy to share. And you can share back, by perhaps dropping off a note or a small thank you gift (maybe a piece of that critrus glazed cake you made with your neighbor's fruit?).

And then they'll happily share some more fruit the next season, and so on, he said.

Burns does offer up a few additonal rules for plucking fruit that is in public. Mainly, don't be a shelfish hoarder. "Just take what you need and leave the rest for the next person." Also, "Don't take unripe fruit." (It's not going to taste any good, it will not ripen on your countertop, and will just end up going to waste.) Instead, come back for the fruit when it's ripe, and then pluck it, he said.