Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/728583
30 OCTOBER 2016 Good Fruit Grower www.goodfruit.com in recent years. They had snow a day or two before the beekeepers arrived this year. They use organic copper sprays, lime sulfur bloom thinner and Blossom Protect, a yeast solution, as prophylactic controls. Meanwhile, commercial heirloom varieties make up about 10 percent of their acreage, and they have 500 trees of other heirloom varieties in a test block. They also grow a few rows of pears and even a little hay. Characteristics of growing area Bountiful water is one of Albano's fortunate geo- graphical quirks. Spring flooding aside, the Cuyama River runs dry a lot of the year, but his farm sits atop an alluvial aquifer. The southern latitude provides warm days and the elevation cool nights, giving him a harvest window simi- lar to Washington's Yakima Valley. The rest of California picks much earlier. Albano has no neighbors, unless you count the occa- sional illicit marijuana grower in the surrounding hills. So, he doesn't have to worry about somebody else's spray drift, but he also has no one with whom to compare notes. University extension staff focus on the larger apple growing region near Lodi. Albano attends industry work- shops and conferences and even hosted an International Fruit Tree Association tour in 2008. His father, Howard, is a past IFTA board member. Albano has faced little pressure from codling moth. His pheromone disruption keeps the pests almost non- existent, he said. He has not seen the brown marmorated stink bug in the orchard, but he knows it has reached Los Angeles. He's afraid it's going to hitchhike one day on his commute. That's a two-hour commute, by the way, which he makes two or three days a week. Albano lives in La Cañada on the outskirts of Pasadena with his wife and three children. Marcel Emea repairs a seal on an irrigation pump. The orchards canal system. At 3,300 feet, the orchard's high altitude has a later season than most of California and produces crops around the same time as Byron Albano says loyal customers keep him in business. "Without that, we're not here," he said. Frost control has become very important to us. In the last 9 years, we have had 5 frost events that have significantly damaged our production. We decided to do something to help mitigate this so our production would be consistent. That's where Orchard-Rite ® wind machines have come into play for us. In mid April of 2014, we reached 24 degrees outside the vineyard, yet we were able to save 100% of the fruit under the machines. Outside of the coverage area, we lost almost all of the fruit. At harvest, we picked over 6 tons per acre in the protected area and less than 1 ton per acre in any unprotected vines. The wind machines also reduced my vine damage. I put the wind machines on 10 year old vines and experienced minimal damage, but any unprotected 1 year old vines were completely decimated by the cold temperatures. In the future, when I set out a new planting, I will install Orchard-Rite ® wind machines to provide protection for the following Spring. Damaging young plants is a huge expense not only in lost production but in extra management costs to replant and retrain damaged vines. I believe that the wind machines will help our Texas wine industry grow consistent crops that our wine makers can depend on to produce superior wines and to reliably supply our markets. "The grape vines under my wind machines yielded 6 tons per acre while my unprotected areas had less than 1 ton per acre." -- Andy Timmons Lost Draw Vineyard Lubbock, TX, USA