Pacific Nut Producer Magazine

Tag: almond pollination

  • Pollinator Partnership Equips Almond Growers with Greater Tools to Prove Sustainability

    Almond growers sometimes get a bad rap in the general public as being abusive to bees or sucking too much water out of the ground, but it is quite the contrary.  Almond growers are stewards of the land, and with the help of the Almond Board of California, and a new ties with the Pollinator Partnership, growers are going to be equipped with great tools to prove their environmental and sustainable practices in the orchard at bloom.  Watch this brief video with the Daren Williams from the Almond Board of California for more details, and read more about it in Pacific Nut Producer Magazine.

     

    Please thank our sponsor Duarte Nursery for their industry support and see them at their booth at the APG Conference in Monterey, March 2-4 (Booths 20-21).

  • Almond Pollination and Hive Removal Timing

    Almond pollination is underway in California and growers are hoping for another good crop this year.  How can you monitor the progress of your bees during almond pollination and determine when it is time to remove the hives?  Watch this brief interview with Billy Synk from Project Apis m. for some answers, and read more about it in the March issue of Pacific Nut Producer Magazine.

  • Enhancing Almond Pollination with Cover Crops

    How do you maximize the efficacy of your investment in bees for a successful almond pollination period?  According to Billy Synk, director of Pollination Services with project Apis m., the answer is planting cover crops in the fall that will flower prior to almond bloom to get the bees active early in preparation for a successful pollination period.Watch this brief interview as Synk explains, and read more about it in the February issue of Pacific Nut Producer Magazine.

    Enjoy our Ag video news?  Be sure to let our sponsor Duarte Nursery know & thank them for their industry support!

  • Bees and Almonds: A Mutually Beneficial Relationship – From the Almond Board of California

    Modesto, Calif., (February 8, 2018) – Almonds depend on bees and bees depend on almonds. In fact, the link between bees and almonds is so important that the relationships between almond growers and their beekeepers often go back years or even generations.

    Between February and March each year, almond tree buds burst into beautiful light pink and white blooms in preparation for pollination. As the trees blossom, honey bees forage for pollen and nectar in the orchard. When the bees move from tree to tree, they pollinate almond blossoms along the way. Each fertilized flower will grow into an almond. After almonds, beekeepers bring their honey bees to different locations across the United States, pollinating over 90 other crops and making honey.

    While bees are essential to pollinate the almond crop, the bees benefit too. Almond orchards help strengthen bee hives because:

    • Almond orchards provide honey bees with their first natural source of food each spring.
    • Just like almonds are a nutritious snack for us, almond pollen is very nutritious for honey bees.
    • Honey bee hives routinely leave stronger after visiting during almond bloom.
    • Beekeepers can then split many of the hives to grow their apiaries

    Committed to Health

    A variety of factors have led to a widely documented and concerning decline in honey bee health, including activities associated with both beekeeping and crop production, putting at risk many of the foods we count on for a stable, nutritious food supply. While the total number of honey bee hives in the U.S. has remained stable for the past 20 years, maintaining healthy, stable hives is beekeepers’ big challenge. That’s why the Almond Board of California has taken extraordinary steps to be good partners to

    beekeepers in promoting bee health. We have funded more honey bee health research than any other crop group with more than 100 research projects since 1995.

    Almond industry-funded research, along with that of other universities, government agencies, and non-profits informed the Honey Bee Best Management Practices (BMPs) for California Almonds. Guidelines for everyone involved in the pollination process, the Honey Bee BMPs provide recommendations ranging from making the orchard a safe and welcoming place for honey bees to how to treat for pest and disease without harming bees.

    The Almond Board of California web site

  • Forage Crops Yield More Successful Almond Pollination

    THANKS TO THIS VIDEO’S SPONSOR

    As growers get into the 2018 almond growing season, they hope for a successful pollination period. According to Billy Synk from Project Apis m., almond growers can achieve better pollination when they plant a forage cover crop in the fall to trigger the bees into activity come spring. Watch this interview as Billy explains, and read more about it in Pacific Nut Producer Magazine.

  • Cover Crops Complement, Not Compete with Almond Bloom

    The engineering of flowering agricultural field borders has emerged as a research and policy priority to mitigate threats to pollinators. Studies have, however, rarely addressed the potential that flowering field borders might compete with neighboring crops for pollinator visits if they both are in bloom at the same time, despite this being a concern expressed by growers. We evaluated how wildflower plantings added to orchard borders in a large (512 ha) commercial almond orchard affected honey bee and wild bee visitation to orchard borders and the crop. The study was conducted over two consecutive seasons using three large (0.48 ha) wildflower plantings paired with control orchard borders in a highly simplified agricultural landscape in California. Honey bee (Apis mellifera L.) and wild bee visitation to wildflower plots were at least an order of magnitude higher than to control plots, but increased honey bee visitation to wildflower plots did not lead to any detectable shifts in honey bee visitation to almond flowers in the neighboring orchard. Wild bees were rarely observed visiting almond flowers irrespective of border treatment, indicating a limited short-term potential for augmenting crop pollination using wild bees in highly simplified agricultural landscapes. Although further studies are warranted on bee visitation and crop yield from spatially independent orchards, this study indicates that growers can support bees with alternative forage in almond orchards without risking competition between the wildflower plantings and the crop.  Read the full report from Oxford’s Environmental Entomology Journal Here.