The 2022 almond flowering season is coming to an end after a great deal of stress for all the growers and beekeepers.
Firstly, the outbreak of Varroa Mite in the north coast area of NSW resulted in a total lockdown of all bees in NSW. Thanks to the work of the Almond Board of Australia, the NSW and Australia Apiarists Associations, NSW Department of Agriculture and NSW government, the ban was lifted just before the almonds began to flower in the Riverina region.
However, there was a ban on bees going into Victoria, SA and Qld from NSW so there was reportedly a significant shortage of bees in Sunraysia almond orchards.
Because of the short notice and inability of beekeepers to fully prepare their hives for pollination, there was some uncertainty about the quality of the hives being placed into orchards. Most beekeepers have responded by adding extra hives to cover any weak hives.
As a general comment, it seems the bees have been of good health, I have not heard of any Varroa Mite infestations being found and with an abundance of flowering weeds and canola, the bees have thrived during this pollination time.
The second concern was the weather. The continuing wet conditions caused orchardists many problems including restricted access to the crop by tractors for weed and fungicide spraying and access by beekeepers. Also, the flowering period has been very cloudy and cool winds, resulting in less than optimal pollinating conditions.
Some growers had to resort to applying fungicides by aerial application as it was too wet to apply by tractor drawn spray carts.
The wet weather also caused some disease issues with Blossom Blight (Botrytis cinerea) causing flowers to die off.
It appears that there were enough fine days for the bees to work effectively and adequate pollination seems to have occurred on most varieties across the region although it may take another 2 to 3 weeks to see if the nuts have ‘stuck’.
The flowering of all almond varieties seems to be quite close with good even flowering within each variety.
At the time of writing, early September, the beekeepers have begun to remove their hives from the orchards as flowering has effectively finished.
Peter Reynolds
Senior Horticulturalist