What are the precautions for harvesting citrus? A summary of the latest key points

The peel of citrus is relatively soft, and it is very easy to cause damage during picking, so more care is needed. Harvesting citrus also has its particularities, so what issues need attention? Here are a few relatively important points to understand.

1. The weather must be suitable

When harvesting citrus, it is not that you can pick at any time; you need to look at the weather conditions. If the weather is bad, picking will have a relatively large impact on the fruit trees, and secondly it is also not conducive to harvesting. Picking in rain, wind, or heavy fog carries relatively high risk and is not suitable for outdoor operations. If there is a lot of dew, you need to pick later, waiting until the dew has dried before picking, otherwise it is easy to cause the fruit trees to become infected with disease. Generally, harvesting in clear or cool weather is most suitable, because in addition to making harvesting convenient, it has the least impact on the fruit trees.

2. Harvest in batches

When harvesting, pay attention to proceeding in batches; do not pick all the fruit at once, because some may not yet be ripe. The first to be picked should be the fruit in the upper-middle position; such fruit is generally of the best quality and can seize the market as a premium variety. To pick the citrus at the top, it is best to set up something like a ladder, to avoid having to pull forcefully because the height is not enough, which would cause great losses. Keep citrus of each grade packed separately. If all the fruit on one tree is to be picked, you can pick from the bottom upward. Everyone can proceed according to their needs, as long as they pay attention to harvesting in batches.

3. Be careful not to damage the fruit

The skin of citrus is very thin, so be careful not to damage the fruit. For safety reasons, pickers should wear gloves, so as to avoid fingers piercing through the citrus or fingernails causing punctures, because once citrus is broken open it rots very easily, which is not conducive to storage and transport. Scissors are standard equipment for picking, but some users, in order to be efficient when picking, no matter whether the fruit is easy to cut or not, solve everything with one snip, causing many fruits to suffer varying degrees of damage. Pay attention to the problem of damaging the fruit. The fruit baskets used for harvesting should be checked for sturdiness; do not use ones with protrusions on the surface. Try to use round ones, as this makes it less likely to bruise the fruit.

Harvesting does not mean the work is over; the fruit trees also need care, and only then is the harvesting completely finished. During the harvesting process, it is unavoidable that some damage will occur to the fruit trees, so these trees need to be treated to prevent the losses from expanding. Next, carry out overall disinfection treatment of the orchard; there are relatively many wounds left from cutting the fruit, and at this time the citrus trees are extremely vulnerable to invasion by external pathogens. Finally, appropriately supplement water and fertilizer, so that some fruit that is not yet ripe can continue to grow.

The above are the issues that need attention when harvesting citrus. Once citrus is damaged, it will rot very quickly in a short time, and then spread to the surrounding fruit. Therefore, when storing, be sure to check more, and take out any problematic ones directly; do not take this risk.