Hello! My name is Dirk Ulrich with UMC,
It is Super Bowl Sunday and again it is kickoff time for the almond season because Bloom is upon us again.
As of this weekend we are at 61 chill portions 1054 chill hours. That puts us above average for the last five years. Two weeks ago, it looked like we were tracking to have a normal bloom timing to possibly a few days later than normal. With the warm weather we have had from the last two storms this sped things up a little bit and it looks like it may be slightly early to normal bloom timing. The cold nights that we are having now is slowing things down a bit.
Where we have Fritz and independent varieties we were emphasizing more on bacterial protection. It looks like for the rest of the month the threat of those cold rains Bacterial blast are not there, however we still need to protect for the warmer disease called Bacterial spot on these varieties. Everybody should be getting their bloom spray material delivered and planning to get started on some of these blocks this week.
It looks like there is a large storm coming out of the Pacific. This storm will cause more rain in the Chowchilla and Merced area than Modesto and Stockton area. Rain should start Tuesday evening. They’re talking close to 2” in the Chowchilla area 1.5” + inches in the Modesto area. The highs will be in the upper 50s to low 60s with the lows mid-40s. This will speed the bloom up a little. If you have pink bud to popcorn stage and you have a lot of acres to cover, you should get started.
We are now mainly protecting against Brown rot now. Brown rot disease doesn’t really get started unless it's an open flower. Some of the more susceptible varieties to Brown rot are Fritz, Wood Colony, Sonora, Butte and Padre. If you’ve had disease in the past you want to start early. There are a lot of blocks where the bloom is not out far enough to cause a problem. Therefore, we could let this storm go by and then start spraying afterwards. After this rain on Thursday there is a 35% chance of rain on the 17th then forecast to be dry until the end of the month.
Spraying when bees are foraging is never a good thing. It is always recommended to spray when bees are not forging during the day. It disrupts them more than we thought in the past. They have done studies by just spraying water and it throws their pattering off for their navigation. This can cause them not to forage for two hours or more. Then with the fungicide materials we use it Irritates them and causes even longer delays for them to go back to foraging nectar and pollen.
Everybody should be getting their irrigation system ready for frost control. It doesn’t look like any cold temperatures in the forecast for the next two and a half weeks. But there’s still lots of potential for frost damage in March. During full bloom almonds can handle 27 degrees for only 30 minutes. Once the nutlet starts to grow and touches the jacket temperatures under 29 degrees for more than 30 minutes can start causing problems. Moist soil holds more sun (Heat) energy and releases at night to keep your orchard warmer. During frost episodes it’s always good to turn water on early to moisten the ground to absorb more heat plus saturate the atmosphere in the orchard to raise dew points. Please call me if there are cold temperatures in the forecast so we can discuss dew points and the threat of frost and when to turn water on.
I hope you enjoyed the Super Bowl today.
Please call if you have any questions.
Dirk Ulrich - 209-531-6662 - dirkulrich55@gmail.com
Jesse Penick - 209- 678-8887 - jesse@ulrichag.com
Daniel Vann - 209-617-3879 – daniel@ulrichag.com
Nicole Groathouse – 209-646-4818 – nicole@ulrichag.com
Emmanuel Moreno – 209-408-3542 – emmanuel@ulrichag.com