In agriculture, continuous harvest is the availability of a crop over an extended period during the growing season. Each crop has a harvest window during which it is ready for picking. Some are harvested by removing the whole plant, for example, cutting a head of lettuce. Others can be picked over varying periods: peas and corn may have a window of two weeks, cucumbers six or eight, tomatoes produce until the end of the season.
To provide a season-long continuous harvest of a crop with a shorter harvest window, succession planting techniques are used, including multiple plantings at different times, and planting of cultivars with different maturity dates. In this way, with effective timing, a new planting or variety of a crop is always coming into maturity as a previous one finishes.[1]
References
edit- ^ Bachmann, Janet (2008). "Scheduling Vegetable Plantings for Continuous Harvest – National Sustainable Agriculture Information Service". ATTRA. Retrieved September 10, 2017.
- Ripening indices and harvesting times of different olive cultivars for continuous harvest. Scientia Horticulturae.
- The effect of new continuous harvest technology of ramie (Boehmeria nivea L. Gaud.) on fiber yield and quality. Industrial Crops and Products.
- Continuous harvest of marine microalgae using electrolysis: effect of pulse waveform of polarity exchange. Bioprocess and Biosystems Engineering.
- Evergreen Agriculture: a robust approach to sustainable food security in Africa. Food Security.
