EVALUATION OF LABOR REQUIREMENTS FOR BURLEY TOBACCO STALK-NOTCHING HARVESTERS

Stalk-notching harvesters initially received a lot of interest by growers because they were the only reasonably priced commercially available options that actually mechanized the harvest of burley tobacco. Field studies were conducted at four different farms—one with a MarCo harvester and the other three with Kirpy harvesters—observing harvesting and hanging operations. Harvesting labor productivity was fairly consistent for three of the four farms with similar wagon load sizes, and considerably higher at the fourth farm that had a much larger wagon load size. Harvesting labor requirements ranged from about 16 to 27 worker-hours (w-hr)/ha (6.7 to 11 w-hr/ac), compared with 64 w-hr/ha (26 w-hr/ac) for traditional stick harvesting of burley tobacco. Hanging labor requirements ranged from about 55 to 76 w-hr/ha (23 to 31 w-hr/ac), comparable with standard hanging labor requirements for hanging stick tobacco in multitiered traditional barns, but considerably higher than reported for hanging stick tobacco on s...