MARKETING PEANUTS 
15 
Accordingly, Virginia-type peanuts are bought on the basis of the 
percentage of jumbo and fancy peanuts that can be picked from 
samples of nuts taken at random from the lot. 
If the peanut grower brings his crop directly to the factory, the 
wagonload is weighed and the lot sampled by the buyer for the plant. 
If the stock is mature and does not contain more than an average 
amount of foreign matter, it is priced according to current market 
quotations. Well-picked and poorly-picked lots are seen in Figure 4. 
An unusual amount of dirt and trash sometimes causes a reduction 
in price. The general run of peanuts varies in size from season to 
season; to maintain to some extent a suitable ratio between the 
relative amounts of cleaned jumbos and fanc} 7 s put out by the cleaning 
plants, the sizes of the grades were formerly adjusted arbitrarily each 
year at the mill, by changing the spacing between the rods in the grad- 
ing machine. Thus in a season in which peanuts generally did not 
grow large the producer would receive proportionately higher prices 
Fig. 4.— Farmers' stock Virginia-type peanuts, well picked (left) and poorly picked (right). (Re- 
duced one-half) 
for small stock than in a year which was favorable to the growth of 
large-sized peanuts. On December 13, 1921, revised specifications 
for jumbos and fancys (as well as for extras and shelled goods) were 
established by the National Peanut Cleaners and Shellers Association, 
a trade association of many of the leading shellers and cleaners in the 
Virginia- North Carolina section (see p. 31), which should insure 
the minimum sizes of these grades remaining unchanged among 
association members. However, many members of the trade feel 
that in view of the competition from well-graded oriental peanuts, 
further tightening of the grades for domestic Virginia-type peanuts is 
necessary. 
Peanuts are largely bought by type and variety. Spanish stock is 
handled bv itself and need not bear any definite relation to the 
