Jacques Naude

William Bronson wrote: I am building a tiny orchard. Right now it has a variety of pear trees and one peach.
To avoid the trap of too much fruit, I was considering nuts.
Almonds fit my diet and the marketplace,and some seem to fit my  climate.
I will be running poultry among the trees.
I aim to supply chefs and foodies in my area,after I get enough for myself.
Water seems to be the issue in California, late frosts here.
I will use grafted trees,I don't have the room for "spitters".
Where should I look for cold hardy almond trees? Any good vendors?
Do I need to keep bees or could the wild local ones suffice?
I've grown some nice peaches without irrigation,I think the rainfall and soil banked water will suffice for the almonds.
I never got any peaches due to squirrels, so I think the almonds will certainly need netting.

Id be careful with peaches and Almonds in the same place, they can cross pollinate as I understand it.

Thanks Dave! I'd mob graze any understory down to the roots just before harvesting. Those ATV nutpickers would allow me to have a pretty nice sized orchard. Nice thing about europe, The farm is 8 hours drice from France, 1 hour from spain and 75min from large city of Porto, not mentioning the many towns and villages around within 45min.

Idea for my wife and I would be to do " BackToEden" garden for veggies, "Miracle Farms" for fruits and nuts and then two productive orchards of a hectare each. Tgen plant other nut and useful trees scattered around the property.

Really hope to be able to create a type if Garden of Eden as we will be having guests too as a type of retreat.

Anyhow, have a great day!

J

Thanks Dave!

Ive read about those nut picker uppers, especially ones pulled behind ATV but wasnt sure it would work for Almonds. Where I live in france, the sticks with metal spiral on end works really well with walnuts.

I was also wondering whether inter planting almonds with other nut trees or nitrogen fixing trees could improve production and lower maintenance. The Monoculture thing just doesnt sit right with me.

Thank you soo much gor your help. Ill post some more stuff as I learn. I was thinking of doing Almonds with comfrey in understory, kept clean by sheep and trailed by free ranging chickens. Do 1 Ha and see how it goes... Organic almonds sell for 28€ a kg in France!!! Meat also unbelievably expensive when organic! If I can get just 15€ with low input and say 2 tons per hectare, thats 30k a year. Would pay for all the other stuff Im hoping to install on the farm.

Thanks again!

Dave Miller wrote:Just wondering if there are any almond farmers here who are either practicing or are interested in organic, permaculture, or polyculture methods in their almond orchard?

I am coming to the conclusion that the industrial monoculture almond industry in California (around 1 million acres) is going to crash.  In the larger scheme of things, this could actually be a good thing, if there are almond farmers who survive the crash - because all eyes will be on them.  IMHO the survivors will be the organic/permie farmers.  We should rally around these farmers, to ensure that they not only survive, but thrive, and thus have 1 million acres of farmers coming to them seeking advice.  If there are no survivors, the farmers will continue to turn to "Big Ag" for solutions, which probably won't be pretty.

In other words, this almond crash could be a huge tipping point to get permaculture methods widely adopted.

I could help by providing materials (hollow stems) and advice on increasing the number of native bees on the farms.  I have been doing this on my property for several years and it has been going well.

Hi Dave,

I am in the process of buying a 40 acre farm in Portugal and am very keen to start a permaculture Almond orchard. On further reading I am a bit worried about the machinery necessary in harvesting, meaning the floors need to be pretty clean and they are costly!

Bought Martin Crawfords new book "Grow your own nuts" and it seems like a good start.

Any of you know of harvesting methods for say 6 acres which wont entail investing in a huge machine? Guess I could employ half the small village for 2 weeks to hand pick?