Irrigation on Light or Heavy Soils

Knowing your soils in the almond orchard, impacts the way you irrigate. Are your soils light or heavy? It makes a big difference.

Bill Brush is CEO with B&B Ag Consulting based in Modesto

“What kind of soil do I have? If its light sandy soil, I’ m going to farm it way different than if I've got a fairly heavy clay. I can't squeeze down much on fertility and on a light sandy soil, because it does not have the nutrient holding capacity like it would have in a heavier clay,” said Bush. “So, I could short it a little bit and work off the bank in a heavy clay type situation or even a moderate clay,” he said.

It's a big difference when it comes to sandy soils in any tree nut orchards.

“When I get to a sand, there is no buffering capacity, there is no holding capacity, either for water or nutrients. There are some great things about sand---- nutrient holding and water-holding are not two of them,” noted Bush. “And so that's why you have to come back and know your soil than to know somebody that you can trust that can help you let's work through these things. You don't get the water right, then you're not going to have the crop that you ever wanted to have,” noted Bush.

In more new, due to Land IQ, satellite vision we now know there's more California pistachio acreage than we thought there was. The current bearing acres for 2021 is 409,000. That's up 80,000 acres over what was previously known. And it increases projections for the future.