CHAPTER VII 

 HARVESTING AND REPLANTING 



HARVESTING 



WHEN the bunch is to be cut, the stem is partly cut through 

 5 or 6 ft. from the ground, and the bunch, with the whole 

 top of the plant, topples slowly over. Care is taken that 

 it does not fall against and injure any other plant. 



The usual custom is to cut fruit by the hundred stems, 

 each cutter by himself, without help, cutting the fruit 

 with a cutlass and catching it. This is, perhaps, a doubtful 

 practice, as owing to want of method cutters running 

 through the walks miss or roughly cut much of the fruit. 

 A better plan is to employ a cutter and a helper who work 

 together. The cutters with their helpers, twelve or four- 

 teen in number, work in line, each cutter having three 

 rows assigned him, or in close planting only two rows. 



On some estates particular care is taken in harvesting ; 

 one man with his pruning tool cuts and manipulates the 

 fall of the head, while another catches the bunch and, 

 when the stalk is cut, hands it to one of the women who 

 are employed to carry it to a particular spot. This is 

 necessary when we remember that a bunch weighs from 

 80 to 100 Ibs. Here a bookkeeper enters it in his book 

 under its proper denomination as a bunch, or one of eight, 

 seven, or six hands ; or he may reject it as unmarketable 

 for any one of several reasons it is not " full " enough or 

 too " full," the fingers are too small, there are not enough 

 fingers on the lowest hand, badly shaped, straggly fruit, 

 rat-eaten or otherwise damaged. Several bookkeepers on 

 a large estate will thus be entering the bunches, while the 



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