Issue link: http://www.epageflip.net/i/1093876
4 A L M O N D O R C H A R D 2 0 2 5 G O A L S WATER USE The Irrigation Station Debuts to Almond Industry Have you seen the spring's most talked about online digital irrigation series? You won't find it on Netflix or Hulu, but rather on the Almond Board of California's (ABC) YouTube channel. Launched in January 2019, "The Irrigation Station" is a new video series for growers, offering relevant, real-world information to help them better meet orchard water requirements, promote tree health and improve efficiency. "Putting timely information in front of growers and their employees based on conditions and activities in the orchard is a key focus of these videos," said Spencer Cooper, host of "The Irrigation Station" and ABC's senior manager of Field Outreach and Education. "Growers deal with a wide range of issues throughout the irrigation season, so we plan on meeting them online with applicable information on a monthly basis." All the information delivered in these videos is derived from ABC's Almond Irrigation Improvement Continuum. Released by ABC in the spring of 2018, the Continuum is a comprehensive manual of irrigation management and scheduling practices. It organizes irrigation practices into three management levels — 1.0 (fundamental), 2.0 (intermediate) and 3.0 (advanced) — and covers the following concepts for orchard management: Measuring irrigation system performance and efficiency Estimating orchard water requirements based on evapotranspiration Determining the water applied Evaluating soil moisture Evaluating plant water status "The Continuum is an incredible 149-page resource with a level of detail that can't be matched," Cooper said. "Our goal is to add value by bringing its practices from the page into the orchard at the time growers can use them. These videos allow us to do that, and they also The pressure chamber is a quantitative method for measuring plant water status, with relationships established between pressure chamber measurements and tree growth and productivity. The Almond Irrigation Improvement Continuum recommends using a pressure chamber regularly to help inform orchard management decisions. "Showing is so much better than telling. What excites me about this series is that we actually demonstrate the tools growers use in the orchard." – Spencer Cooper