Native to the southeastern part of the US, Pecans are mostly found in places that experience cold winters and hot summers. Being a nut tree, pecans usually grow around the autumn to winter season (during the holidays). Today, pecans are mostly used by confectioners or bakers and are awesome additions to any baked goods. You can find them in muffins, cakes, bread etc. If you are a small-scale farmer who grows pecans for your own use or for profit you can use these steps to learn how to harvest pecans effortlessly.
How To Harvest Pecans
- Depending on the size or the quantity of the whole harvest, you can either take a short time or longer. Start by checking if the pecans are ripe. You can do this by assessing whether the hulls have opened up. If so, your pecans are ripe and ready for harvest. Mostly pecans ripen during fall and the start of winter; therefore you should start checking your nut trees around that time.
- If your pecans are ripe you can choose to wait for the pecans to fall off the tree and collect them of the ground. You could also shake the tree itself and dislodge the pecans and collect them. Choose whatever works for you and harvest your pecans. You should be ready with containers where you can collect the pecans for proper storage. Depending on the size of your harvest, choose the container that fits perfectly.
- Once you have harvested the pecans, you should carefully assess them to make sure they are not damaged. Sometimes there might be wormholes or other pests that eat through the shells making the pecans bad. If you come across such pecans, discard them before they can damage the good ones. You can either choose to collect pecans from the ground as you carefully assess their condition or collect them in large quantities and sort them later.
- If all the pecans in your basket are in good condition, air them out properly by drying them in the sun. Remember, any wetness could result in damage making the whole harvest a total waste. Once you have harvested your pecans, dry them out completely in the sun. This also makes it easy to break the nuts out of their shells. You can take as much time as you need to make sure the pecans are completely dry. There is no harm in letting them dry a little longer than usual since it makes it even easier to crack the shells open.
- You can test if the pecans are completely dry by removing the pecans from the shells and breaking them in half. If they break effortlessly, they are completely dry and ready for use. You can now sell them to the local bakery for profit or simply add them to your baked muffins or bread.
Remember to store your pecans in an air-tight container to prevent any damage. Note that, just like any other nuts, pecans are very easy and effortless to harvest. Wait for the right conditions to make sure your harvest goes on without any problems.
Check out http://bestpecansforsale.com for more information.
