On the topic of arecanut harvest after it falls to the ground I would like to add that Bhaskar Saveji told me that they follow the same system for coconut at his farm.Getting the coconuts picked from the tree is quite expensive there and they dry the fallen coconuts for copra and oil extraction. I have heard this from some of my relatives in South Canara too where it is very difficult to get people to climb the trees to harvest coconuts.
Regards,
Yaj.
In continuation to what Yaj said here, we use long bamboo poles to pluck arecanut and coconut. A sharp sickle/knife is tied to the pole to make the cutting process easy. The coconuts are then collected and loaded up in a tractor trailer and taken to the storage shed.
Nowadays, it works out on contract basis. You pay a specified amount (depending up on the number of trees) to the a group of laborers (3-4 of them). They do plucking thru storing. It works out to be around 4-5 rupees per tree. Whereas climbing a tree would work up to 15 Rs I guess.
There is also no harm is leaving the coconuts to dry and fall off if you have permanent labors and if you plan to sell copra instead of fresh coconuts.
-Biju
While talking about picking up fallen areca nut, One of my relative has found out a way. He has a stick of about 2.5 feet. He has two nails on the bottom tip of the stick. While picking the nuts he dosent bend he just pierce the nut and nut gets stuck on the tip of the stick and he removes it from hand and put it in bag.
Limitation is that, he has only less than 2 acres of land. and picking is not scheduled. After breakfast everyday he just wanders with stick and bag and collects the nuts and put it for drying. He doesnt have a target to pluck all the nuts in perticular day.
He has cleverly avoided bending to pick the nuts and made it easy.
There was discussion on easing the efforts of picking of fallen arecanuts(I could not find the thread)
Here is a simple equipment to pick fallen areca nuts.
