LOCAL almond growers couldn’t fault this year’s better-than-average crop as harvest wound down across the region.
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Almond grower and Griffith councillor Paul Rossetto couldn’t identify any major flaws in his nuts.
“It’s been a good season, good yields, good quality, the rain hasn’t affected them at all, in fact it settled the dust which is good, and prices are rising as we speak,” Cr Rossetto said.
“We run three varities to stagger the work and we’re winding down the last variety now.
“We started the last week in January and the only setback was that we started a week too early because there were a few green nuts.”
Lake Wyangan almond grower Denis Dinicola said everyone in the local industry was happy with the way the season panned out.
“We had a little bit of rain interference but nothing that’s affected the quality of the almonds,” Mr Dinicola said.
“If anything it probably wasn’t cold enough during winter, but we harvested an average to a little bit above average yield so we did OK.
“You can’t be positive until the nuts are weighed after they’ve been through the huller and sheller, which will happen in a month or two, but we’ve got a good idea it’s a bit above average.”
Benerembah farmer Garry Carlon was roughly halfway through his harvest and was more concerned about further rain on the horizon.
“I’ve got one eye on the weather and one eye on the crop, as we’ve had a stop-start harvest so far,” Mr Carlon said.
“The rain hasn’t yet affected the quality of the almonds and we’re pretty happy with the harvest so far, but with another few weeks until we finish harvest I am hoping for settled weather.”