How’s the best way for you to improve your harvest efficiency? Honestly, it isn’t by reading books, watching videos, or going to conferences. And it isn’t by continually trying to reflect on your own farm. (Even though that is really important.) The best way to improve your harvest efficiency is by working on farms that … More Harvest efficiency tip #7 work on other farms!
Let’s wrap up this harvest spreadsheet series by planning your harvest day. Now that you’ve calculated your harvest rates you can use that information to figure out how long your harvest will take. And with this spreadsheet you can allocate when in your day you have time to harvest each crop. Once you start this … More fsa tip #67 Plan your harvest day
Fill your hands with beans or tomatoes or whatever you’re picking before putting them in your bin. Is this one too obvious? Well, it’s still harvest efficiency tip 3. ???? ???? ???? Let’s say it takes 5 seconds to pick a tomato and 5 seconds to put that tomato in your harvest bucket. And let’s … More Harvest efficiency tip #3 Fill your hands!
Are you harvesting fast enough? To figure that out you need to compare your Harvest Targets and your Harvest Rates. So this spreadsheet does just that! Start off by entering your harvest targets and the spreadsheet will set your harvest thresholds. Next fill out the harvest log (just like in Spreadsheet Tip #65) and then … More fsa tip #66 Are you harvesting fast enough?
This is Harvest Efficiency Tip #2! Here’s what carrot harvests steps might look like: Broadfork to loosen Pull carrots Remove any roots that don’t look the way you think a carrot should look Remove any obvious bad leaves Bunch with elastic Leave bunches in piles of 5 Pack 3 bunches of 5 (15 carrots!) in … More Harvest efficiency tip #2 break your harvest into clear steps.
Bring what you need to the field. This is harvest efficiency tip #1. If you’re bunching carrots – bring bins and the elastics you’ll use to bunch them. Bring enough bins and enough elastics. Going back to the barn for more elastics mid way eats up your time and sinks your harvest efficiency. ???? ???? … More Harvest efficiency tip #1 bring what you need
This is spreadsheet #2 in the Harvest Efficiency series. This sheet gives you a place to record how much you harvested and in how much time. The spreadsheet turns that into Units / Hour. Then using your sales prices – that becomes $ / hour! Now you don’t have to do this for all your … More fsa tip #65 Track your harvest rates
You’re probably just about to jump into a lot of harvesting on your farm. This might be a good time to stop a moment and think about your harvest efficiency. My next few spreadsheets will be about how to evaluate and improve harvest efficiency on your farm. The starting point is knowing what your harvest … More fsa tip #64 Set your $/Hour Harvest Targets