Winter Sanitation Important in Almonds

It's called the mummy shake in almonds. And it's an important part of winter sanitation to get those mummy nuts out of the trees, which could be harboring navel orangeworm larvae.

“And we know from years of research and experience that winter sanitation is really the pillar of a good integrated pest management program for combating navel orangeworm,” Ashley Knoblauch, Communications Specialist at the Almond Board of California. “Of course, there's other tactics that you'll employ throughout the year, but this is really the way that you're going to get yourself off on a good foot for the new year,” she said.

Essentially, winter sanitation is just going through the orchard and shaking those trees once more to make sure all the mummy nuts or any nuts, not harvested falls to the ground, and then disking those up to make sure that there's no navel orangeworm survives.

Again, disk them into the soil or flail mowing is very important.

“Because if there is navel orangeworm it will slumber over the winter, you're going to have some serious issues leading up to your next crop yea,” said Knoblauch.

And Knoblauch said it really culminates into a loss of returns. “Which is the biggest heartbreak, of course, and not what we're looking for, and we know that navel orangeworm is the number one pest in almonds that we're trying to combat currently,” she noted.

And it is a very tough pest to control. “The Almond Board has for years, been investing in research in controlling this pest,” Knoblauch said.