Almonds grow on Mike Young’s farm in Buttonwillow, about 25 miles west of Bakersfield. He used to grow tomatoes, cucumbers and cotton, but in recent years has almost exclusively to nuts. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)
Young switched to nuts in part because he doesn’t need large crews of farmworkers to plant or harvest them. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)
A machine called the shaker grabs and jostles an almond tree, causing the ripe nuts to fall to the ground. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)
A sweeper machine pushes the fallen almonds into a neat row, to be collected by yet another machine. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)
George Lopez directs the driver of a shuttle cart to dump almonds onto a conveyor belt. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)
The conveyor belt pours the almonds into a trailer, which will then take them to be shelled. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)
