Looking for a neat place to dump all your unwanted trash?

Look no further. That's what farms are for. Yes. Farms are easy targets for illegal trash dumping. I'm glad we have fences around our ranches.

Every now and then, Lane and I talk about the trash along the Whitmore Ave. fenceline. So we organized a cleanup on Monday morning and collected 13 trash bags! It was a joy to drive along Whitmore Ave and see the clean fenceline.

The plan going forward is, Lane will have the guys do a weekly cleanup like they do over at Carpenter. Thank you, Lane. I wish people had more pride and would clean up after themselves. Maybe now that it is clean, people will refrain from throwing trash, I think it has had a helpful impact at Carpenter.

Irrigation systems are not cheap!

This has been a year of big expenses. The irrigation system being the biggest one! I guess that's a big reason reason half the farms in california do flood irrigation.

After researching and debating between sprinkler system and the drip, we went ahead with the drip.

1. Sprinkler system:
• Pros: Cheaper establishment cost, keeps the soil surface smooth, requires less labor, good for frost protection.
• Cons: High electricity consumption, problem with wetted branches, uses more water.
2. Drip system:
• Pros: Efficient water usage, uniform tree growth.
• Cons: Needs to be irrigated frequently, no frost protection, higher establishment costs, higher maintenance, lack of reserve moisture in the soil.

Although we have plentiful water supply from TID and ground wells, we decided against installing sprinkler system, hoping the drip will pay off in the longer term. I am not so sure now really. The other day, I read a research article from UC on how sprinkler system is better. Oh well!

We hope the irrigation system will be the last of the development expenses. The next year should just be ongoing farming expenses. Still, income from Whitmore ranch is a couple of years away, so crossing my fingers!

We work hard all year long just to get to know these numbers..

Final crop production numbers are in.. Not a good crop year.. Oh well.. I'm sure we'll have a great one next year.

The poor weather was partially responsible for the low yields this year. The other big factor was that the Nonpareil variety bloomed early relative to the other varieties. Nonpareil yields were lower than expected industry wide, and the statewide crop is coming in lower than the crop estimate. In this area the best yields were derived from Monterey, Fritz and some Carmel varieties. That is certainly evident in our numbers!

A small step for a baby almond orchard. A giant leap for the health of mankind..

Strawberries are sweeter than sweet potatoes!

So, we have about 30 acres of open land that we are evaluating what to do with in the short term. We'll simply be renting it out for a season of course. Options are:

1. growing sweet potatoes 
2. strawberry patch (that sells to Plant Sciences). 

We think the strawberry grower shows great promise as a good temporary tenant. They run a very clean operation. They have been renting ground near Lane's house for the last several years so he has seen how they work and maintain the property.


More importantly, strawberry plants would have the advantage of not depleting the soil of potassium to the extent that potatoes do. They also tarp fumigate the soil each year.

Satellite guided precision. Check.

Let the almond tree planting begin.

Benefits of modern technology. We have state of the art GPS controlled precision planting the rootstock. Praying to God to turn this into a bountiful almond orchard in three years.

Land fumigation to prep for orchard plantation

You will be surprised how much work is involved in preparing the ground for planting a new orchard planting. One of the important steps is Fumigation. 

Fumigation is one way to control parasitic nematodes that cause serious damage to the root system. Nematodes are tiny aquatic animals that live in the water films surrounding soil particles. Fumigation will not eradicate the entire nematode population, but only reduce them to a level so serious crop damage will not occur.

  

Trellis structure for Candy-cots, and ground prepped for almond trees..

Candycots are a special variety of apricots that are three times sweeter than your average apricot and much more favorful. You can smell the sweet apricots from ten feet away. 

The last pic is of our new baby almond orchard at Whitmore.

Almond harvest of nonpareil variety at Carpenter ranch

We like what we see so far..

Raising hundred kids must be easier than growing a few acres of Candycot trees!

Wow, what a labor intensive process growing these candycots has been! It's been several weeks since the crew budded the first batch of candycots onto the rootstocks.

Since then, it has been a constant process of progressively cutting back the rootstock and encouraging the new buds. The buds were much slower in starting to grow than we were expecting causing a great deal of anxiety, but we are finally seeing some results. 

Some buds are still very tiny and just starting, but others have a few inches of growth. It is too early to determine what percent have been successfully budded, but we think and hope will be in the 80 to 90% range. 

The trees on which the buds do not "take" will continue to grow as rootstocks and we will dormant bud them this winter.

Hull split is moving along in the Nonpariel variety..

Hull split is a sign of nut maturity. Once the shell is exposed, we have to watch out for nut feeding pests like naval-orange-worms.

Hopefully we will begin shaking late next week or early the next. The trees have grown a lot this summer. I think the mild weather has helped.

PureSense system irrigation data rocks, btw!

Candycot budded rootstock looks ok so far..

We budded more of the Lovell (peach) rootstock to candycot. If I didn't say this before:

 Budding is a technique of propagation where a vegetative bud removed with a bark is united with another plant (rootstock). It's an alternative to grafting. The following diagram helped me when I was first introduced to this concept by Lane.

It always helps to have good irrigation water. It's therapeutic to sit by the canal when you want a break from work!

California has a diverse geography and complex water usage situation. Depending on the region and irrigation district, the price of water for agriculture varies from a few tens of dollars to hundreds of dollars per acre-foot. We are blessed to be in the former category. 

We lost some of our beloved trees to the city..

May they rest in peace! The sewer project by the city at Carpenter is moving along and they are in the covering phase. So far they have managed to do the project while removing only a handful of trees.  The contractor doing the work has been a pleasure to work with and very accommodating. 

Some of the tree rows are really starting to close in, a real challenge for our tractor driver on the mower. But, I love seeing the dense foliage!!

Are you ready for budding?

Well, our baby candycot orchard is..

Budding is like grafting but we only attach a small baby branch to the plant in the ground so less invasive and more delicate.

The rootstock have been growing nicely (see pics). We should be able to bud over to the Candycots sometime in June. The trellis system installation is labor intensive but moving along. Lane hired a young man to do the installation and he seems to have taken an interest in doing a good job. Derk VanKonynenberg has provided the specialized tools we need and came out early on to give some instruction. Derk has been available to answer questions and has been very helpful.


BTW, The V-shaped trellis structure helps us to train the trees to grow in such a way that all parts of tree get plenty of sunlight so leading to better fruit yields.

Mother's Day canal blowout :o)

This falls into the "it's always something" category. Sunday morning I got a call from Lane who got a call from the Ditch Tender that the canal had collapsed and water had flooded into Carpenter.

Apparently the canal had a leak through a crack in the side wall. As water leaked into the soil it found a gopher burrow and began to flow through it. It slowly eroded the soil until the wall collapsed and the water gushed out. When a farmer down stream lost his water pressure due to the collapse, he investigated and called the ditch tender. Fortunately it happened during daylight and was caught very quickly. It flooded an area 25 rows by about a quarter of the length of the rows. No real harm was done and as of today there is very little standing water. Despite it being Mother's Day morning there was a great response from TID (as you can see by the trucks in the picture) and they got it repaired in a hurry. Thank you, Turlock Irrigation District!! And, Hope you had a great rest of Mothers Day, Lane!! :)

You can't burn it but you can sell it for firewood? Really?

So the tree chippers finished a few weeks ago and hauled off the chipped trees. Not a lot of them. A normal by-product of the process is pieces of wood and roots laying around that are too small for their equipment to capture.  We spent quite a bit of time collecting the wood and putting it in piles to burn.  When we contacted the Air Pollution Control District to add the property to our burn permit, they said that type of burn is no longer allowed on sites larger than 20 acres.  

When we asked about alternatives, their suggestion was to sell it for firewood!  Can you imagine, we can't burn it but we can burn gas hauling it all over creation for other people to burn! So, we decided to hire a chipper and chip them into, well, chips! I know this costs us money but we think this is the best option.

It's always better to have someone live at the farm than have the security people patrol.

The mobile home is coming along nicely and I think we will end up with a decent place for some good tenants. Once we pick up the wood left behind and we are ready to disk the ground to clean up the weeds when it is dry enough.

Flooding.. Baby orchard in trouble! TID saves the day.

OK. Here's the scoop! The pipeline that runs through the property was filled last week when a neighbor irrigated. There were lots of leaks! Some were causing flooding of areas which, if allowed to continue, would kill our new trees. But T.I.D. was very responsive. Tim flagged all of the leaks and the manager of the repair crew toured the orchard. The district emptied the pipeline and had a crew working on the leaks for two full days.

TID was also very prompt in getting our new pump panel connected. We will run the system next week and Landmark Irrigation will flush the system and install the "figure 8's" on the ends of the hoses. That will mark the completion of the installation of this phase of the irrigation system.

Trellis system for candycots (fancy apricots)!

In the early stages of installation. Unfortunately, their machine broke down and they will be gone until next week some time.

Trellising is used for canopy management so the interior parts of the tree will get plenty of sun and fruit abundantly. Kinda spreads out foliage to facilitate photosynthesis. Otherwise, excessive shading may lead to lower yields. Plus, trellis system also makes it easy to prune, spray and harvest.

Wind winding down the Bloom!

One day, the almond trees are covered with clouds of flowers..

The next, crumbs of white petals are scattered all over the fields, like long streaks of snow shining in the sunlight.

Latest research: Stop pruning your almond trees!

"Many of us grew up believing in the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy, but at some point in our childhood we realized they were just fairy tales. As difficult as it may be, grown men will someday have to realize the same thing about pruning their almond orchards." Says this research article authored by our friend, Prof. Roger Duncan.

http://cestanislaus.ucanr.edu/files/111772.pdf

Highlights:

• The notion that almond trees need to be pruned every year to increase or sustain yields appears to be just flat wrong. 

• Past and current University of California trials suggest that growers are not getting a return on their pruning investment. In fact, the numbers suggest the opposite: the more growers prune, the more they may reduce their yields and profits, even in the long term. 

• I know that the “need” to prune almonds is so deeply ingrained in our brains that it may be difficult to change our ways. However, the scientific evidence is now so compelling that it is hard to ignore. 

• Orchards older than 10 years should not be pruned for the purpose of sustaining yields, period. Realistically, almond orchards have to be pruned a little on occasion for reasons other than yield. Limbs that are dead, broken or diseased, or are safety hazards for equipment operators have to be removed. 

• Conclusion: A good compromise may be to train the trees during the first two years (to reduce scaffold splitting and safety pruning in later years) and then abandon pruning in later years.

Final bloom update.

After the morning fog burned off about 10 am, it was a pretty fair bee-day today. Pics taken at 11:30 am and there is already a lot of bee activity.

 Petals are beginning to fall, especially Nonpariel, also notice the amount of water on the ground. There are still a few more days for pollination to occur.

Based on Lane's conversation with Blue Orchard Bee apiculturist, these bees are very effective pollinators and are active at cooler temperatures than honeybees. There are challenges in managing them, but people are learning how. I think we will supplement the honeybees with them next year if he is successful in increasing the size of his bee population. 

They are solitary bees, not social.

Cloudy with a chance of honey balls (get it? :)

Here's the deal with bees: Bees do not fly when the air temperature is below 55 degree F.  Neither do they come out when the wind velocity is above 12 mph. Any signs of rain shut them off as well.

Tues morning was cool and cloudy with no bee activity but around noon it cleared up to mostly cloudy but with some sunshine (temp 50's). The bees took advantage of the opportunity and were very active. We are so glad we have strong colonies that can take good advantage of the limited pollination time that we have had. 

The trees will be blooming for several more days, hopefully?  One of the attached pictures shows the Monterey with some unopened blossoms remaining. The Nonpariel are on the later half of their bloom time.

Rain rain go away.. Come again another day..

By this time, you probably guessed how crucial bees are for almond crop. So bees decided not to come out on Monday morning (who likes Monday mornings, right?). but the afternoon cleared up and the bees were very active. But again they took leave of absence on Tuesday, as it was cool and cloudy in the morning and raining all afternoon. 

Lane says this is one of those very wet years that we periodically have to endure with almonds since they bloom in the middle of winter! A wet spring is not unusual with an El Nino event in the Pacific ocean. We are glad we decided to purchase crop insurance. :)

Look at these gorgeous bloom pictures.