--- On Tue, 10/13/09, Geoff Manning <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

http://www.fao.org/docrep/x5337e/x5337e02.htm

Spanish beekeepers we recently visited indicated that there was no paid pollination of almonds in Spain.  In fact they seemed somewhat bemused by the idea.
Geoff Manning

Part of the report is as follows:  "At the moment the Spanish production is only correlated to the large
almond planted areas, while the production per hectare is very low.
However, in new irrigated orchards, production is very high and
competitive with American cropping (1.0-1.2 tons/ha of shelled almond).
Various problems affect Spanish almond: non-homogeneous
production, low production in dry areas and small farm size. Also, in
the new orchards the pollination problem is a strong constraint."
Note that at the bottom of this portion of the report, it mentions that pollination "is a strong constraint".  And that is the Spanish report, not an addendum by someone else.  The production quoted for the U.S. is : "The average per hectare yield exceeds 1.3 to 1.5 <tons> of shelled product."  This is still higher than the highest average quoted for the Spanish production.

Mike in LA




      

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