Field day in the greenhouses and Citrus groves

I took David Connell, a farm manager from Florida, to a field day in Israel. During this day, we learned a lot about the ways to yield high quality citrus

Right after the Agritech I had the pleasure of hosting David Connell, a farm manager from Florida that is directly in-charge of large acreage of fruit production orchards, mainly citrus groves.

Beside of being a hard working fella and a real agriculture enthusiast, David was very keen to get a glance at the Israeli farming system with a focus on Citrus, of course.

Chatting on the way to my sales jurisdiction, I was informed that the Florida citrus growers are facing quite difficult times: the Greening Disease, estimated as the toughest problem nowadays, causing huge damages and trees death. Water quality became an issue since the EC climbs from year to year and there's a lack of Nutrigation know-how and water-soil analyzing service.

Meeting all these challenges is a great mission that requires experience and extra attention to parameters of soil moisture and fertility, and David couldn't agree more.

I designed this visit to cover a day-by-day field work: we examined soil extractors in greenhouses and discussed the technical issues of placing and extracting. after that we went through solution analysis methods using my portable-lab, and what every figure means. Needless to say that David has turned out to be a very efficient filed technician (I hope you will agree Dave (: )…

This session and others took place at flowers and vegetables greenhouses during all morning. This was a very nice introduction to the main visit location: Citrus groves in Ein-Vered, one of the most established citrus cultivation territories of Israel.

We met Uri Muchan, a citrus guru and one of the leading Israeli citrus growers: his farm holds several varieties of Citrus, experiments and Citrus nursery. Actually, his farm is a center of attraction for citrus growers, citrus guides and researchers.

Accompanied by another local grower, we had a long round-table discussion and brainstorm, before we popped to the field to observe the methods-and-hardware of the Israeli citrus experts.

It appears that in term of nutrigation, the use of tensiometers and soil extractors is a must, especially in problematic terrain. Plus, water quality is examined on a frequent base in order to monitor and adjust the fertilization program.

Seasonal sprays of Bonus (along with other plant control and growth) and strict pest-monitoring that complete the cultivation program, enable very good and quality yield.

We finished the tour in the fascinating tractor museum nearby. As two farm-guys like David and myself, old and preserved agricultural machinery is a must, every now and then.
All the best Dave – hope you enjoyed and took some useful tools with you.

Want to learn more about citrus growing? Click the next link: http://www.haifa-group.com/search_results/?filter_crop=Citrus#search_results