Almond Leaders Host Environmental Tour

By David Eddy|April 1, 2009

Recycling of pruned limbs, integrated pest management, and sensor technology for efficient irrigation were a few of the topics discussed recently when the Almond Board of California held its annual Environmental Stewardship Tour. A large contingent of government regulators were on hand at the Quinn River Ranch east of Modesto, CA, to see how the almond industry is implementing cultural practices that protect the environment in a whole host of different ways.

The ranch, which is managed by the father and son team of Nick and Joe Bavaro of Bavaro Farming Co., is clearly a progressive operation. Besides a tour of one of the orchard blocks, several almond equipment manufacturers were on hand to show off their state-of-the-art hardware. Here are a few highlights of the tour.

• More options for growers seeking to dispose of pruning waste are available than ever before. In the old days, growers would simply burn the waste wood, but that’s no longer an option because of air quality restrictions. Many growers have been chipping up the prunings — or utilizing a tub grinder for large pieces like stumps and uprooted trees — and then hauling them to a cogeneration plant. The ash from the cogeneration plant is then returned to the orchard for blending into the soil, completing the cycle, said Joe Bavaro. However, some growers, said Stephen Heinrichs of JackRabbit, are finding that it’s more cost-effective to sell the chipped prunings to dairies, where it’s used as bedding for cattle.

• Bavaro also showed off their PureSense irrigation system, which allows them to make sure they don’t waste a drop of water. That’s more critical today than ever, as growers are facing the third year of drought, and water has become a very precious commodity in California’s Central Valley. In fact, the system, which allows them to monitor soil moisture to a depth of 60 inches, showed them that their trees were at a deficit in January. That’s troublesome, as it’s normally the state’s wettest month. They ran the system, which takes soil moisture readings every 13.5 minutes, for an eight-hour period to ensure the orchard’s health, said Nick Bavaro.

• Discussing their integrated pest management plans, Joe Bavaro noted that they no longer spray a dormant season application of an organophosphate (OP) to control such pests as peach twig borer. They’re not alone among growers, noted David Doll, a University of California Cooperative Extension agent in Merced County and member of the Pest Management Alliance. By employing good orchard sanitation techniques, such as removing mummies, many growers are finding that they can forgo dormant OP sprays and use softer products such as diflubenzuron (Dimilin, Chemtura Corp.) or methoxyfenozide (Intrepid, Dow AgroSciences).