Almond Living Magazine

From Orchard to Pantry: The Almond Harvest Story, Part 2

Picking up where we left off, here’s the second phase of how 80% of the world’s almonds are harvested from California’s orchards. After shaking, sunning, and sweeping, it’s time to make some moves! Once the almonds have finished drying in their neat rows throughout the orchard, farmers drive a pick-up machine – or “harvester” – over them, vacuuming the nuts...

Shake, Sun, and Sweep: The Almond Harvest Story, Part 1

It’s harvest time! For the California almond community, harvest – which occurs between August and October – is the busiest and one of the most exciting times of the year. Using specialized equipment and several steps, each nutritious 1 almond has quite a journey to get from California’s orchards to your pantry! Let’s start at the beginning… During the first...

BBC Future Reports on Water-Saving Tech Used by California Almond Farmers

What do NASA, almonds, JJ Ramberg and microsprinklers have in common? Each feature in the latest episode of BBC’s Follow the Food series, which focuses on water and profiles “innovators making extraordinary strides in protecting this finite resource.” With interviews from the Almond Board’s senior manager of irrigation and water efficiency, Spencer Cooper and UC Davis researcher Daniele Zaccaria, the...

Water Management is a Complex Issue in California. But We Need to Tackle It Together

By Brian Wahlbrink, almond farmer Special to The Sacramento Bee Of all the issues that have crossed Gov. Gavin Newsom’s desk during his first 100 days in office, water might very well be the most complex. How the state manages this precious resource is an urgent concern for residents, businesses, environmentalists and the agricultural sector. I am an almond grower...

ABC Invests in Washington State University Honey Bee Health Experiment

Happy World Bee Day! Without honey bees there would quite simply be no almonds so California’s almond farmers have a deep, vested interest in protecting their health. Because of their essential role in almond farming, moving pollen from flower to flower and pollinating the crop along the way, the California almond community has funded over 100 bee health research projects...

Beer, Plastic, Insect Feed: Almonds Find Unexpected Uses in Journey to Zero Waste

This post first appeared on Sustainable Brands on May 2, 2019. Almonds are a fantastic food — they’re packed with [6 grams of] protein, have good fat, are an excellent snack themselves and make great alternatives to milk and flour products. But almonds may soon bring us joy in a host of new ways. The almond industry is growing while...