Harvesting and Yields of Pecans 123 



kudzu have been planted, or in native groves, the sheets are 

 a necessity, since otherwise a great many nuts will be lost. 

 These sheets are commonly thirty by sixty feet, although they 

 may be varied according to the spread of the limbs of the 

 trees. In some instances a series of rings are attached to the 

 end of the sheet, through which a rope is passed so that it 

 may be drawn from tree to tree by a mule. 



When the nuts are knocked to the sheet, the rear corners 

 from the direction the pickers are traveling are grasped and 

 pulled by hand. This inverts the sheet and dumps the nuts 

 in a windrow at the front or forward edge. Here the nuts are 

 separated from the husks by hand, placed in bushel baskets 

 or some other convenient receptacle, and carried to the pack- 

 house or shed where they are to be dried. Some growers 

 do not separate the nuts from the hulls until they reach the 

 pack-house or shed. If the nuts are spread and allowed to 

 dry for a few days, they are much more easily separated 

 from the husks. This work is termed ''shucking pecans." If 

 the nuts cannot be separated from the husks after a few days' 

 drying, they are likely to be faulty and should be thrown 

 in with the culls. 



The cost of harvesting depends very largely on the variety, 

 the size of the trees, and the yield. The price usually paid 

 for harvesting is from one to two cents a pound. A good 

 picker will gather from 75 to 200 pounds a day. 



In order to prevent waste and thievery, a number of gi^owers 

 have the nuts picked as many as four times during the season. 

 As soon as a large percentage of the husks have split, showing 

 that the nuts are mature, they are knocked off and picked up. 

 This operation is repeated as the nuts mature until the entire 

 crop is harvested. Other growers wait until most of the husks 



