It’s That Bloom-iful Time of Year

Tis’ the season of beauty and blooms in the almond farming world. While the bees pollinate the sprouted blossoms, we are lucky enough to  enjoy the gorgeous decoration of nature. Did you know that Almond blossoms are one the earliest blossoms to bloom each Spring? While they do get a head start on the blooming […]

Posted on February 21st, 2022

Blossom Season Is Here!

As you may have noticed driving around Chico or the surrounding areas, everything is a’bloom! It’s our favorite time of year.  Almond blossoms come from the deciduous tree in the rose family known as Prunus dulcis. They are relatives of the apricot, cherry, peach and plum families.  Our trees will keep producing blossoms until about mid-end […]

Posted on February 20th, 2021

The Buzz on Bees

You may not know this, but almond trees only blossom in California about three weeks of the year in the month of February. Guess what? It’s almost February!   We thought we’d take a moment to share with you why this short time frame would be impossible without the help of our friends, the bees. […]

Posted on January 21st, 2021

Certified Kosher? What’s That?

With summer coming to a close, it’s almost time for people around the world to celebrate Rosh Hashanah, the first day of the Jewish new year. It’s a holiday marked by special prayers, family gatherings, festive meals and—yum!—sweet foods like eggy challah bread and apples dipped in honey. Nuts and fruits are nearly always present […]

Posted on August 4th, 2020

Why Squirrels Are Nuts About Nuts…and Other Nutty Fun Facts

At my home, we have—well, I won’t call it an infestation of squirrels, but many uninvited furry guests. They’re cute and entertaining, but they don’t clean up after themselves, and my potted deck garden is where they like to live it up. Which got me wondering about why squirrels are as nutty for nuts as […]

Posted on July 14th, 2020

This Independence Day, Celebrate Family Farms

Family farms are so important! In fact, according to the National Institute of Food and Agriculture of the USDA, more than 90% of farms in the U.S. are classified as small family farms. That’s a lot of family love grown into our food supply. But due to factors that include climate change, giant agribusiness and […]

Posted on July 2nd, 2020

It’s Honeybee Season!

bee in almond flower

The almonds are in full bloom and that means the bees are here, too! Yay! Almonds and honeybees have a very important relationship with each other. You can’t have almonds unless the trees are pollinated—they don’t pollinate themselves! And honeybees love delicious almond flower nectar, especially since almonds are one of the first flowers to […]

Posted on February 25th, 2020

Happy National Honey Bee Day!

Bee on Almond flowers

National Honey Bee Day is Saturday, August 17. The USDA designated the third Saturday in August an official “awareness” day about 10 years ago to recognize the importance of our bees and the beekeepers who tend them. What’s the buzz all about? Well, did you know that, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, these […]

Posted on August 15th, 2019

The Artistry of Almond Blossom Season

Gathering Almond Blossoms by John W. Waterhouse

It’s Bloom season here in Chico. It’s been raining more this year than most, but our bees did find a break in the weather to help pollinate the trees. Time will tell how well they were able to do. In the meantime, it is always glorious to see the almond trees burst into bloom. Locals […]

Posted on March 5th, 2019

We Couldn’t Do It Without the Bees

Maisie Jane's Honey

Meet one of our biggest business partners: the honeybees! The importance of bees for almonds is so valuable that the relationships between almond growers and the beekeepers we work with go back for years. Almonds, like many crops, are not self-pollinating. So between January and March we depend on bees coming into our orchards to do […]

Posted on February 12th, 2019