Farm Focus: Almond Orchard is In!

Last week we planted our new almond orchard! We put 2,665 trees into the ground on 20 acres. Though it’s only been about a week, these trees have a good start. As you may have read in previous articles, we do a lot of work to prepare the soil in a new orchard in order to
give the trees an environment in which to thrive. Healthy, biologically active soil is key to tree growth and development.

Luckily, the land on which we planted these almond trees gave us a head start. The acreage was fallow for several years. Upon initial visual inspection of the soil’s structural appearance, the soil looked average. Rachel, Farmer Al’s assistant and soil tester extraordinaire, was pleased to find that organic matter and organic carbon were at high levels. Letting fields fallow is a common practice for building soil health and we were pleased to find validation of this practice at our new acreage.

In this almond orchard and in all of the newly planted fruit orchards, we are implementing a new irrigation systemunderground drip tape. Most of our established orchards
use either above ground micro-emitters or above ground drip tape. With underground drip tape, we hope to reduce the evaporation losses of water associated with
above ground irrigation systems and reduce our water
needs.

The variety of almonds we have planted is a self-pollinating tree called Independence. But, as we are ever interested in fostering habitats for beneficial insects and pollinators, we are excited to partner with Project Apism. Their “Seeds for Bees” program provides diverse cover crop seed to almond growers, to serve as forage for honeybees and native bees. Project Apis m. will create a custom seed mix with low moisture requirements and
staggered flowering, so the bees will have ample forage when they need it. We’ll have more updates on our almond orchard in the future but we don’t expect to see a harvest until 2021.

Posted in Blog Tagged with: , , , , , , , , ,

Recent Posts

  • Recipe: Pork Chops with Apples and Onions

    Pork Chops with Apples and Onions
    via Martha Stewart

     
    Ingredients:
    6 bone-in pork chops (loin or shoulder), cut 3/4 inch thick
    Coarse salt and fres…

  • Farm Focus: The Buzz with Bees

    Spring is synonymous with blooming flowers and where there are blooming flowers there are bees! And while most people think  of European honey bees, we  w…

  • Fruit & News of the Week: April 9, 2018

    This Week’s Fruit:
    Minneloa Tangelos
    Twin Girls Farm, Dinuba, CA
    The Tangelo is a cross between a mandarin and grapefruit. Its skin is easy to peel and its f…

  • Recipe: DIY Orange Soda

    Via Food52

    Ingredients:

    4 oranges
    1 lime
    1 cup granulated sugar
    Lemon lime seltzer water

    Method:

    Zest the oranges and the lime and add all o…

  • Farm Focus: Jim Churchill of Churchill-Brenneis Orchard

    Jim of Churchill-Brenneis Orchard, never imagined himself becoming a farmer, though he grew up walking through friends orchards on weekend trips from LA. His pa…