Saturday, May 19, 2012

The curious case of a green almond.

Lane is my teacher. He explains, with a well placed dissected green almond on his palm: "The process of solidification of the nut meats continues to advance from the tip of the almond toward the base. This is visible as the gelatinous material becomes opaque. As this process continues the nuts become heavier. This is an early-harvesting Nonpareil nut. Interestingly, the later-maturing Monterey and Woods Colony nuts are just as far along in this process." Good to know.




Thursday, May 17, 2012

Oat bales dry and ready at Whitmore

This will be the last non-almond crop that we plant. If all goes well, almond trees should be planted in this space by end of fall/winter.

Growing oats has been Lane's project. He thinks growing hay has been interesting, much more passive than nuts and fruit, but kind of fun for a change.
All of these 1000 lb bales are ready to be delivered to cows to be turned into milk.



Wednesday, May 2, 2012

Oats harvesting at Whitmore

Oats were cut today. They will need about 10 days of drying before they can be baled and sold. Then we can begin getting this field ready to plant almonds this fall! But, do we make enough money to cover oats cultural costs. Remains to be seen!