PRELIMINARY TRAILS WITH MECHANICAL HARVEST OF GOOSEBERRY

In the period 1989–1992 the trials on mechanical harvest of two gooseberry varieties/White Smith and Lady Delamere/were performed.
Ten year old bushes, about 1.1 m high, were planted in the rows spaced 3.2 m with different distances in the row, ranging from 0.3 to 1.0 m.
Harvest was performed with a currant hervester KPZP-3 "Arek" mounted on a tractor 6 kN, picking fruit from half of the row.
Working speed was about 1 km/h and shaking fingers vibration frequency 16.6 Hz.
Efficacy of harvest amounted 0.1 ha/h, with 85 % accuracy.

It was proved that fruit harvest accuracy depends on plant density within the row, height of bushes and height of lower combs attachment in the harvester.

Hand gooseberry picking is time consuming and obnoxious task.
Working productivity fluctuates greatly from 6 to 16 kg/h.
Large fruit on thornless bushes are easier to pick.
An increase of gooseberry production depends to a great extent on introduction of mechanical harvest.
Tractor mounted harvester, working on half of the row, with 3 persons team, can collect fruit from 0.1 ha in an hour.
When yield per ha amounts 15 t it means 500 kg/m.h.

In the Experiment Station at Dabrowice an gooseberry plantation was established to estimate the influence of plant density within the row on harvesting accuracy.
It included two cvs: White Smith and Lady Delamere planted at the distance 3.2 m between rows.
For White Smith distances in the rows were as follows: 0.3; 0.5; 0.7 and 1.0 m.
For Lady Delamere: 0.3; 0.5 and 0.7 m.

First trials were performed with the berry harvester KPZP-3 "Arek" mounted on tractor 6 kN.

Characteristic of KPZP-3 "Arek" harvester

Length at work	–	5.9 m
Length for transport	–	4.9 m
Width	–	2.2 m
Height	–	2.2 m
Power	–	tractor
Working speed	–	0.7–1.8 km/h
Output	–	0.1–0.15 ha/h
Service team	–	3 persons

Harvest was performed at working speed about 1 km/h and shaking fingers vibration frequency 16.6 Hz.
The characteristic of bushes, fruit yield and harvest accuracy are given in Table 1.

The data show certain regularity.
The highest accuracy was obtained with the

VI International Symposium on Rubus and Ribes

Z. Salamon, D. Chlebowska

https://doi.org/10.17660/ActaHortic.1993.352.13