26 The Bulletin. 



As to the digging of peanuts, great care should be exercised in selecting the 

 time. The croiJ can be greatly damaged if dug too early, and a great majority 

 of the best peas will be lost if we wait too late. One should examine liis patch 

 carefully from time to time and as soon as those heavy peas around the tap-root 

 begin to shed oti", then is the time to begin digging. If dug earlier there will be 

 too large a per cent of young peas near the ends of the braaiches that are not 

 matured. It has about been decided that the largest per cent of good peas will 

 be saved if the crop is dug after a few have shedded. If a few are lost in the 

 ground hogs will get them, but if dug too early those immature peas will be lost. 



The running pea does not require so much care at the time of digging. They 

 are plowed up and shaken out with a fork, and can be stacked very rapidly; but 

 with bunch peas it is different. In digging this variety the peas should all be 

 turned one way, as far as possible, when shaken out, and great pains should be 

 taken in stacking to turn the peas to the pole. It takes some time to do this, 

 but if they are carefully stacked in this way there will be veiy few damaged 

 nuts. They should be put up so the peas cannot be seen from the outside. If 

 they are to stay in the field till late the peas saved from the blackbirds will 

 pay for the extra time in stacking them in this w^ay. If they are dug after frost, 

 however, there will be very few mildews anyway. 



Each pea-pole should be buried deep enough to prevent its being blown over 

 by the storms. A little extra time and expense at this point will pay a good 

 per cent, for it does not take many stacks of good peas to hire a man to bury 

 well the stack-poles of a whole crop. More than half of all the peas of a stack 

 that has been blo\\Ti down and lain there in the winter weather will be lost. I 

 use an auger made for the purpose of boring holes. It is made of three thin pieces 

 of iron so put together as to bore a hole anywhere, it matters not how hard the 

 ground is. This hole is made about the size of the pole and when buried in this 

 way there is little danger of its blowing over, unless the pole breaks. Right 

 here let me say a word in regard to the vise of old poles. Frequently men con- 

 sider it a saving to use poles several years, but this is a mistake; pine poles- 

 should never be used more than two years and then they should be well protected 

 during the time they are not in use. They are apt to break off just at the ground 

 and cause a great deal of damage to the crop. 



There should always be one or two strong pieces of wood about six or eight 

 inches long, nailed to the pole five or six inches above the ground to protect the 

 peas from the ground, because all those that are near the earth will be damaged 

 by the dampness. As to protecting the tops of the stacks with grass, I cannot 

 agree with some farmers. The peas that I "capped ofT," as we call it. most care- 

 fully last year, had more mildews than those I only tied a vine around the pole. 

 I do think that a piece of grass or a vine should be wrapped around the pole at 

 the top of the stack to prevent the water entering there. And as peas should not 

 be packed around the pole, but put up lightly, it is a good plan to go around and 

 push down this grass after the peas settle, especially if they are to stay in the 

 field until late. 



A peanut farmer from Virginia, riding through Hertford Covmtv some time- 

 ago, said we made the mistake of making the stacks too low, and claimed that 

 the higher the stacks the fewer the damaged peas, which theory is reasonable. 

 We know that the lower the stack the more stacks we will have, and the more 

 stacks we have the greater the number of exposed peas. 



Tlie pickings of the fields hold quite an important place among peanut farmers. 

 A great quantity of pork is killed each year which is fattened principally on the 

 peanuts left in the field after digging. If they are well cured, peaniit vines after 

 the peanuts are picked off. make an extra good winter feed. I believe they are 

 better when the peas are picked by machine than when picked by hand, as the 

 machine breaks the vines and blows out the dust and dirt. 



Peas should be picked off just as soon as they are dry enough to shake in the 

 hull. And if they are bringing a good price, that is the best time to sell. The 

 lontrer they are kept the greater the loss. There is some objection on the part 

 of the buyer to the machine-picked nuts, but I consider it more of an excuse to 

 down the machines than anything else, because I have seen peanuts picked by 

 Benthall's Improved Picker that were even prettier than those picked by hand- 



