Every year this beautiful flowering herb overwhelmed us with its seductive scent, especially during the harvest. Lavender blooms at different times throughout the season. It mostly depends on the climate, the weather, and the blooming period of lavender variety. Harvesting begins from the end of the spring until summer and even later.
Harvest time also depends upon the end product. Lavender grown for either fresh-market or dried bundles, should be harvested when the first one or two flowers have bloomed on the stem. If the flowers are in bloom at harvest, the bundles will drop most of the flowers and buds from the stems after drying. If the end product is buds, then lavender should be harvested when approximately one-quarter to one-half of the lavender flowers on the stem are in bloom. However, if the end product is an essential oil, the optimum time to harvest is when approximately half of the flowers on the stem have withered. The oil accumulation is at its maximum, and quality is typically at its peak.
Lavender must be dry when harvested. Harvesting when wet can cause discoloration, mold in bundled lavender and can potentially result in chemical changes in the essential oil that can reduce quality. It is also ideal not to harvest when it is very hot, which may cause wilting and oil reduction. The best time for harvest is from mid-morning until early afternoon.
Lavender flowers may be harvested in different ways. For the home flower garden or the small lavender farm, the flower stems are frequently cut and harvested by hand. The ideal tool is a curved, serrated blade with a handle. Large commercial lavender farms use more modern mechanized methods to harvest lavender flowers. Large harvesters are driven through the blooming flower fields where the lavender stems are cut and the flowers are placed into a cart towed behind ready to go to the distillery. This is more cost-effective for the growers as they can harvest their flower quickly, drying lavender when the essential oil content is at its peak.
Every step of lavender production, from planting, pruning, maintaining to harvesting, drying, and storing you can track in AGRIVI farm management system. It also allows you to keep records of everything you do during the lavender production. Now, during harvest time, you can track how much lavender bundles are harvested, the number of workers, and their efficiency per day and field to know how much to pay them. For machinery also, you can track work hours and fuel consumption.
Enjoy fragrant lavender harvest and use AGRIVI can help you increase the level of your work’s traceability.
