Narcissus and Daffodil

Production of Narcissus bulbs 93
Two-stage lifting requires considerable labor for picking up bulbs, and is used on
small farms or specialist operations and where it is usual to leave bulbs in rows on
the soil surface to dry naturally (‘windrowing’), as is the traditional practice in
south-west England. On small farms bulbs may be collected into trays, net bags,
or bulk bins. One-stage lifters vary in complexity, from small tractor-mounted
machines to large lifting machines which may be manned (for picking off clods by
hand) or un-manned and which deposit bulbs in bulk bins or trailers (Figure 4.8).
Specialised bulb lifters may be used, or machines designed for lifting potatoes or
onions can be modified. Effective separation of bulbs and clods is the key element
in bulb lifters. The machinery should be designed to minimize mechanical damage.
Specialist machinery is available for lifting bulbs grown in beds on sandy soil.
Bulb handling for sale or re-planting
This phase includes any post-lifting fungicide treatment, drying, storage, cleaning,
grading and inspection, as well as, for re-planting stocks, HWT and associated
treatment. HWT was described above, under ‘Pre-planting Bulb Treatments’. All
these operations are key to the control of base rot in susceptible stocks. In trials
with highly infested stocks, even when no fungicide was applied (at post-lifting or
in HWT), the introduction of consistent optimum bulb drying and storage
regimes reduced the level of base rot markedly (Hanks, 1992b, 1996b).
Ideally, diseased and damaged bulbs should be removed at all stages of bulb
handling, although this is labor-intensive and impractical in most stages of
handling in bulk. Diseased bulbs could include those with obvious rots as well
as dry rotted bulbs (mummified bulbs and ‘puffers’). There are no automated
methods of detecting and removing diseased bulbs. However, ‘floater-sinker’
Figure 4.8 Large unmanned bulb lifter discharging into bulk trailer (Photograph:
Horticulture Research International).