Harvesting of Horticultural Crops – SS1 Horticulture and Crop Production Lesson Note (Second Term)

What is Harvesting?

Harvesting is the process of gathering mature crops from the field. In horticulture, timing is everything. If you harvest too early, the fruit is sour; if you harvest too late, it becomes rotten or “over-ripe.”

Unlike maize or cocoa, many horticultural crops (like tomatoes and spinach) are very soft. If you handle them roughly during harvest, they will bruise, change color, and nobody will want to buy them.

Why Harvesting is Special in Horticulture:

• Multiple Times: You don’t just harvest once. You might pick peppers from the same plant every week for two months!
• Delicate Touch: Most horticultural crops are harvested by hand to avoid damage.
• Perishability: Once you “cut” the plant from its roots, it starts to die. You must move fast!

Tools for Harvesting

We don’t use heavy machines to harvest garden crops. We use small, sharp, and clean hand tools.

1. Secateurs (Pruning Shears)

• Use: For cutting the stalks of fruits like mangoes or clipping flower stems.
• Why: It gives a clean cut that doesn’t tear the plant’s skin.

2. 2. Hand Trowel or Garden Fork

• Use: For lifting root crops like carrots or onions out of the soil without breaking them.

3. 3. Sharp Knife / Sickle

• Use: For cutting leafy vegetables like Ugwu or Soko.

4. Harvesting Baskets / Crates

• Use: For carrying the harvest.
• Pro-Tip: Plastic crates with holes are better than sacks because they allow air to flow, which keeps the vegetables cool.

Knowing When to Harvest (Stages)

How do you know it’s time? We look for “maturity indices”—which is just a fancy way of saying “signs of being ready.”

1. Visual Signs (Looking)

• Color change: Tomatoes turning from green to red; Oranges turning yellow.
• Size: When the okra reaches the size the market likes.
• Drying up: For onions or garlic, the leaves start to turn brown and fall over.

2. Physical Signs (Touching)

• Firmness: A watermelon should feel heavy and sound “hollow” when you tap it with your knuckle.
• Ease of leaf snap: For okra, if the tip snaps easily when you bend it, it’s fresh. If it just bends without snapping, it’s too old (fibrous).

3. Time (Counting)

• Some farmers just count the days since they planted. For example, “This pepper is 90 days old, it must be ready.”

Methods of Harvesting

There are two main ways we gather our crops in Nigeria:

1. Manual Harvesting (By Hand)

This is the most common method in horticulture.

• Hand Picking: Simply plucking the fruit (like peppers or garden eggs) with your fingers.
• Digging: Using a fork to lift tubers.
• Cutting: Using a knife for vegetables.
• Pros: You can choose only the ripe ones and leave the green ones for next week.

2. Mechanical Harvesting (By Machine)

This is rare for small gardens but used on very large farms for crops like beans or potatoes.

• Pros: It is very fast.
• Cons: It often bruises the crops, and the machine cannot tell the difference between a ripe fruit and a rotten one.

Post-Harvest Handling (After the Cut)

The work doesn’t end when the crop is out of the ground! To keep your harvest fresh for the market, follow these steps:

1. Cleaning: Remove soil from carrots or onions. But be careful—don’t wash tomatoes unless you are going to sell them immediately, as water can make them rot faster.
2. Sorting & Grading: Group the big, beautiful fruits together and put the small or slightly bruised ones in a different pile. This helps you set different prices.
3. Cooling: Keep the harvest in a cool, shady place. Never leave harvested vegetables under the direct Nigerian sun, or they will “faint” (wilt) in 30 minutes!
4. Packaging: Arrange them neatly in baskets or crates. Don’t pack them too tightly, or the ones at the bottom will get crushed.

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