diff --git a/plugins/parsers/avro/README.md b/plugins/parsers/avro/README.md
index c071cbb06fc9f..1444208e439bd 100644
--- a/plugins/parsers/avro/README.md
+++ b/plugins/parsers/avro/README.md
@@ -108,7 +108,8 @@ The message is supposed to be encoded as follows:
   ## associate that field with the first type it sees for a given
   ## its value.  If it receives another measurement with a different
   ## type in that field, it will discard that entire measurement.  Be
-  ## sure you know what you're doing if you use the "any" type.
+  ## sure you know what you're doing if you use the "any" type, or
+  ## "nullable" with more than one non-null type.
   # avro_union_mode = "flatten"
 
   ## Default values for given tags: optional
diff --git a/plugins/parsers/avro/parser.go b/plugins/parsers/avro/parser.go
index cab68f20260c1..792f252d3d6e9 100644
--- a/plugins/parsers/avro/parser.go
+++ b/plugins/parsers/avro/parser.go
@@ -162,9 +162,9 @@ func (p *Parser) SetDefaultTags(tags map[string]string) {
 }
 
 func (p *Parser) flattenField(fldName string, fldVal map[string]interface{}) map[string]interface{} {
+	// Helper function for the "nullable" and "any" p.UnionModes
 	// fldVal is a one-item map of string-to-something
 	ret := make(map[string]interface{})
-	// Helper function for the "nullable" and "any" p.UnionModes
 	if p.UnionMode == "nullable" {
 		_, ok := fldVal["null"]
 		if ok {
@@ -172,13 +172,7 @@ func (p *Parser) flattenField(fldName string, fldVal map[string]interface{}) map
 		}
 	}
 	// Otherwise, we just return the value in the fieldname.
-	//
-	// WARNING: if you once write a measurement to InfluxDB, and you
-	// later give it a measurement which has a field with the same
-	// name but a different type, InfluxDB will reject the entire second
-	// measurement.  Be sure you know what you're doing if you turn
-	// on "any", or you use "nullable" but there's more than one non-null
-	// type that your measurement can be.
+	// See README.md for an important warning about "any" and "nullable".
 	for _, v := range fldVal {
 		ret[fldName] = v
 		break // Not really needed, since it's a one-item map
@@ -259,7 +253,6 @@ func (p *Parser) createMetric(data map[string]interface{}, schema string) (teleg
 			fields[k] = v
 		}
 	}
-
 	var schemaObj map[string]interface{}
 	if err := json.Unmarshal([]byte(schema), &schemaObj); err != nil {
 		return nil, fmt.Errorf("unmarshaling schema failed: %w", err)
@@ -307,8 +300,7 @@ func (p *Parser) createMetric(data map[string]interface{}, schema string) (teleg
 	} else {
 		timestamp = time.Now()
 	}
-	m := metric.New(name, tags, fields, timestamp)
-	return m, nil
+	return metric.New(name, tags, fields, timestamp), nil
 }
 
 func init() {
diff --git a/plugins/parsers/avro/schema_registry.go b/plugins/parsers/avro/schema_registry.go
index 45e725d19a2b7..bbb467dd7f81e 100644
--- a/plugins/parsers/avro/schema_registry.go
+++ b/plugins/parsers/avro/schema_registry.go
@@ -29,14 +29,13 @@ type schemaRegistry struct {
 const schemaByID = "%s/schemas/ids/%d"
 
 func newSchemaRegistry(addr string, caCertPath string) (*schemaRegistry, error) {
-	caCert, err := os.ReadFile(caCertPath)
-	if err != nil {
-		return nil, err
-	}
-
 	var client *http.Client
 	var tlsCfg *tls.Config
 	if caCertPath != "" {
+		caCert, err := os.ReadFile(caCertPath)
+		if err != nil {
+			return nil, err
+		}
 		caCertPool := x509.NewCertPool()
 		caCertPool.AppendCertsFromPEM(caCert)
 		tlsCfg = &tls.Config{
diff --git a/plugins/parsers/avro/testdata/union-array/expected.out b/plugins/parsers/avro/testdata/union-array/expected.out
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000000..7651a0067d667
--- /dev/null
+++ b/plugins/parsers/avro/testdata/union-array/expected.out
@@ -0,0 +1 @@
+array,name=pi data_0=3,data_1=3.0999999046325684,data_2=3.140000104904175,data_3=3.1410000324249268 1682509200092000
diff --git a/plugins/parsers/avro/testdata/union-array/message.json b/plugins/parsers/avro/testdata/union-array/message.json
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000000..b1c265ca46c2e
--- /dev/null
+++ b/plugins/parsers/avro/testdata/union-array/message.json
@@ -0,0 +1,5 @@
+{
+    "statistics_collection_time": 1682509200092,  
+    "data": [ 3, 3.1, 3.14, 3.141 ],
+    "name": "pi"
+}
diff --git a/plugins/parsers/avro/testdata/union-array/telegraf.conf b/plugins/parsers/avro/testdata/union-array/telegraf.conf
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000000..9d6c42f2e6c75
--- /dev/null
+++ b/plugins/parsers/avro/testdata/union-array/telegraf.conf
@@ -0,0 +1,25 @@
+[[ inputs.file ]]
+  files = ["./testdata/json-array/message.json"]
+  data_format = "avro"
+
+  avro_format = "json"
+  avro_measurement = "array"
+  avro_tags = ["name"]
+  avro_timestamp = "statistics_collection_time"
+  avro_timestamp_format = "unix_ms"
+  avro_fields = ["data"]
+  avro_union_mode = "any"
+  avro_field_separator = "_"
+  avro_schema = '''
+        {
+                "namespace": "constants",
+                "name": "classical",
+                "type": "record",
+                "version": "1",
+                "fields": [
+                        {"name": "name", "type": "string"},
+			{"name": "data", "type": "array", "items": "float"},
+			{"name": "statistics_collection_time", "type": "long"}
+                ]
+        }
+  '''