Green gram-Harvest and storage

Green gram normally comes to harvest in 60 days. The green gram pods will turn from green to yellow to black on ripening. This is the right stage for harvest for seed purpose.

Delay in harvest will lead to shattering of pods and infection by pests and diseases. In case of irrigated crop, the ripened pods can be collected in one or two pickings and dried on the threshing floor.

If the plants come to even harvest, then the plants are cut and spread over the threshing floor to dry. The plants will dry and become black and pods may start splitting.

The plants are then beaten using pliable sticks to prevent damage to seeds. After thorough beating, the seeds are separated from pods. The plant debris are removed and seeds cleaned by winnowing.

Cleaned seeds are then dried on tarpaulin on the threshing floor until the moisture content is reduced to 10 %. Grading is done using round holed sieves of size 2.36 mm.