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Welcome to your fifth and final Bountiful Bloom Update for the 2025 growing season. If you missed our last update, here's the March 10, 2025, Bountiful Bloom Update.
Let's dive into the summary of how the 2025 Almond Bloom went.
🌸 Bloom Summary for 2025
Feb 5 - March 13, 2025
Based on observational submissions, the overall duration of the 2025 bloom was slightly above average.
Observations for green-tip through petal fall bring the 2025 bloom length to 36 days, down -9 days over last year and up +5 days over California's 23-year average bloom length of 31 days. This average was calculated using public data and Bountiful's collected data.
🌳 2025 Almond Bloom Progress
Daily observations of bloom this year were consistent throughout the Central region of the state, followed by the South, with sparse observations in the North. Overall, Bountiful Bloom averaged around 8 submissions per day during bloom.
You can see this below for the 2025 Almond Bloom showing the progression of bloom stages by region reported by day👇.
😊 2025 Almond Bloom Sentiment
The sentiment for the 2025 Almond Bloom was generally not great. Bloom observations began with good to average at the start of bloom in early February and then spiked between extremes of excellent and poor, with most staying in the average to good range.
👇 You'll see how the bloom sentiment shifted by date per the submissions received from Bountiful Bloom.
This shift in sentiment during bloom can be attributed to the localized weather patterns. Specifically, precipitation and wind impacted sentiment submissions. On days with precipitation, sentiment submissions were reported poor to average, and on days with no precipitation, sentiment submissions trended from good to excellent.
Below 👇 you'll see precipitation during bloom for Stanislaus County, Feb 5 - March 13, 2025. This county was representative of most of the bloom observations we received this year.
Other weather events to note for the 2025 bloom were several hail events throughout the valley. These occurred on March 2 and March 13. These events were sporadic across Madera, Merced, Stanislaus, and Fresno counties.
While hail this season caused photos to circulate in the industry, it's important to highlight that this isn't the first time we've seen hail during bloom or early nutset. For example, there were reports of hail in Fresno for 2021, which can be found here. Fresno County's average yield in 2021 was 2,488 lbs per acre. You can find the California average yield for 2021 in the screenshot below 👇.
❄️ Chill Portions & 🐝 Bee Flight Hours
Chill Portions this season were enough to meet the requirements for almonds, and were slightly down from last year.
❄️ California Cumulative Chill Portions in 2025 across all regions were down -2% to -7% compared to 2024.
👇 Below you'll find the Cumulative Chill Portions and Cumulative Bee Flight Hours during bloom by region for the North, Central, and South for the following years: 2025, 2024, 2023, 2022, 2021, and 2020.
🗒️ 2025 Bloom Conclusions
Overall, 2025 Almond Bloom conditions were just ok, with conditions being mostly between good and average. And there were mixed extremes across the valley, with some areas/days seeing excellent bloom and other areas/days seeing poor bloom. There were also a couple of hail events, albeit localized. Temperatures, min and max per day, were more extreme when compared to past years but averaged out to be normal. We had enough Chill during dormancy for almonds to meet their minimum requirements but Bee Flight Hours saw a marked decrease over last year.
Comments on the 2025 crop size...
We've already heard speculative crop estimates ranging from 2.4-2.7 B Lbs for 2025. We find the early crop size speculation to be too soon. Why? Because 'good' or 'bad' blooms do not necessarily result in high or low new crop supply. There are more factors that affect production.
📉 2025 Bountiful First Forecast Release
Bountiful's first almond forecasts for yield, acreage, and production for 2025 will be released in early April, exclusive to our Premium Subscribers.
And yes, that's right around the corner so stay tuned 😎
✉️ Email Megan to learn about Bountiful's Premium Subscriptions
This Week's Featured Almond Shot
Taken March 23, 2025 in Merced County. 📸 by Morgan M.
🙏 Thank You!
Thank you for all your observations during the 2025 Almond Bloom. This data and summary would not be possible without you 💜. And to those who followed along our Bountiful Bloom update thank you for reading!
