The first date palms in the United States were grown from seeds planted by Franciscan and Jesuit missionaries who began founding their missions in California in 1769. Although a number of large seedling date gardens were planted, none were successful. In any large group of seedlings only about one-half of the palms are female and produce fruit.

Modem date growing, in the warm, fertile Coachella Valley is a far cry from the primitive areas pursued in much of the Old World. Coachella Valley growers did borrow the "harem" idea, however, and plant one male palm for every 50 females. This arrangement is more efficient for large- scale production, but it necessitates that each female blossom be pollinated by hand. 

All of the dates grown here at Oasis are I00% organic, so the ripening fruit bunches are covered in late July with large mesh bags to protect them from birds and insects until they are ready to be harvested. However, even with all our precautions, nature will always find a way. And, that’s not a bad thing because sometimes Nature creates something very special!

Mixed Dates, or seedlings, are a special date fruit. These organic dates do not have a specific name or type that they identify under; which is why we call them ‘seedlings’. They are a mix of organic date fruit that differ in size, flavor and texture. These date fruits were planted and nurtured by Mother Nature herself. This typically occurs when seeds from one date palm tree fall to another palm tree (sometimes natural or sometimes birds will drop seeds).This will create an ‘offshoot’. At first, this baby offshoot will appear to belong to the date palm it’s attached to. However, as the offshoot grows, you can notice the difference in the date fruit. These offshoots grow to maturity while being nurtured by the date palm the seedling happened to land around. The result is a delicious and nutritious mix of organic dates we call Nature's Dates!

What makes them unique?