This report covers conditions and observations made on Thursday, February 12, 2015.

The first image of Nonpareil and Monterey rows illustrates excellent overlap of bloom. The second picture is a close up of a bee foraging for pollen in a Monterey flower, followed by a Price branch in bloom.

Beautiful spring-like weather again graced the Northern San Joaquin Valley Thursday. Morning lows in the mid 40’s rapidly gave way to afternoon highs in the mid 70’s. The small traces of fog burned off early and gave way to a calm, clear, wonderful day. Conditions made for the best bee activity of the season as orchards were humming all day long as bees put in 8 hours of solid work. This weather is occurring at the perfect time as more and more flowers open each day and plantings start to approach their peak bloom.

Early blooming Sonora variety will likely be in peak bloom by the weekend with some advanced plantings already exhibiting peak flowers presenting for pollination. The Nonpareil cultivar is approximately 3 to 4 days behind Sonora with more flowers presenting for pollination each day. California type varieties and Monterey appear to be in virtual lock step with Nonpareil. The Carmel variety remains 2 to 3 days behind Nonpareil. The late blooming Butte variety is starting to show an occasional open flower as almost all of the Butte buds have broken dormancy. The Butte pollenizer, Padre, is beginning to progress more toward bloom with an occasional popcorn bud being observed. On the whole, more and more petal tips are being observed in Padre as buds are transitioning from the green tip stage to the pink bud stage.

With ideal weather conditions, pressure from disease remains low. As a result growers are pushing back fungicide treatment until the weekend to try and maximize the effectiveness and minimize the number of treatments needed.