Why Won’t My Almond Tree Fruit?
So maybe getting nuts from your almond tree wasn’t the only reason you planted it. It provides shade and height for your landscape, but you also really hoped to get a harvest of almonds out of it. An almond tree not producing nuts can be a big disappointment. One reason that you may not be seeing nuts yet is that you just haven’t waited long enough. Nut trees can take a few years to begin producing. For almonds, you may have to wait until it is four years old before you see nuts. So, if you got a tree from the nursery and it was only one year old, you may just need to be patient. Once it gets going, you can expect up to 50 years of yields. Another issue may be pollination. Most cultivars of almond trees are not self-pollinating. This means they need a second tree in the area for cross-pollination in order to bear fruit. Depending on the cultivar you chose, you may need to select another one for your yard, so that pollinators, like bees, can do their jobs and transfer pollen from one to the other. If you don’t have the right combination, you will get no nuts on an almond tree. For example, two trees of the same cultivar will not cross-pollinate. Some of the common almond cultivars used to produce nuts are ‘Nonpareil,’ ‘Price,’ ‘Mission,’ ‘Carmel,’ and ‘Ne Plus Ultra.’ One cultivar of almond, called ‘All-in-One,’ will self-pollinate and can be grown alone. It can also pollinate the other cultivars. If you have an almond tree with no nuts, there is likely to be one of two possible and simple solutions: wait a little longer or get a second tree for pollination.
