The bright silence of an young orchard..

Whitmore 2nd leaf almond orchard..

Training candycot (fancy apricot) trees on V-shaped trellises

The more sunlight a tree can intercept, the more photosynthesis will happen, the more tree grows, the more it gives.. So, a trellis structure maximizes sunlight interception by the tree leading to better tree health and higher yields. In the absence of trellising, the tree canopy spreads like an umbrella where outer parts of it get a lot of sun but the interior part struggles.

Roto-tiller at work at Carpenter ranch

We have hired a rototiller to come in to loosen up and smooth the soil. We have a lot of "sink holes" where the soil has fallen in to cavities formed way back when the ground was ripped. The rototiller does a nice job of loosening and smoothing. In the worst areas the holes are too deep to fill in and we will follow him with our orchard "float" and roller. We will end up roto-tilling probably more than half of the middles.

When wind and roof fight, wind always wins!

We had a terrific wind all day and in the afternoon there was a period of extreme gusts. We lost very few trees, but the wind badly damaged the roof of the house. It lifted the top layer of the roof and peeled back a section. A good portion of the Styrofoam insulation blew out. A portion of the sheet metal tore. I am pretty sure we will have to replace the whole roof.

Carpenter Trees

With their thick branches, far and widely spread..

Looks fine, but frost remains a threat thru May..

Our current evaluation of the crop is that it is good, but not spectacular.

We still have some hurdles to get over before harvest of course. Frost, worms, weeds, diseases and ants, to name a few. The nuts are large enough that they could withstand a short duration frost. The ground is finally dry enough that we can travel on it. We are finishing a fungicide spray that has taken a month to apply because of the interruptions by rain.

Carpenter ranch update: One spray to defend. One spray to protect.

We applied a spray of herbicide to the entire floor of the orchard. We then mowed the dead weeds and the orchard cleaned up nicely.

We also finished applying the "hull split" spray. The spray includes an insecticide for Peach Twig Borers and Navel Orange Worm, the two most serious worm pests of almonds, and a miticide.