If you grow apples in Michigan or New York, it’s time to simplify your harvest.
November 1, 2024
It’s harvest season for apples and millions of crates of fruit are being picked and loaded into packhouses and cold storage.
How do you keep track of it all?
Solutions can range from expensive barcode systems to permanent markers and 8.5″ x 11″ paper. This season, a simple and low cost technology for managing harvest made its way into apple farms in Germany. American family-owned farms, stand to benefit all the same.
A Game Changer in Apple Harvest
Farmable is a user-friendly farm management app for recording crop treatments, field notes and most importantly; harvest records. At $399 for an annual subscription, the tool is a no-brainer for simplifying record keeping. At the request of several apple growers, Farmable launched a new feature for harvest labels in August 2024. It immediately got adopted by German apple grower Jan Pape, from outside Hamburg, who grows Elstar apples on his 100 acre farm.
“I manage the harvest recording securely in one place. There are hardly any errors made by employees or me, the farm manager, when preparing or following up the harvest day,” says Pape.
Super Easy Set-up
We asked Jan to comment on the new harvest label features. Here is what Jan and his team had to say about adopting a new tool, just days before harvest began.
How did you label your harvest bins last season?
“I used a program for printing business cards – always 10 business cards on an 8.5″ x 11″ sheet; then cut it up… sometimes you have too few in the morning, but sometimes just too much… or I could forget it altogether.”
How much time did it take him to get started with the Farmable harvest labels?
“The setup is super easy/foolproof and was done in just a few minutes”
Who is benefiting from the harvest labels most in his operation?
“I think we all have a benefit. By record harvest and printing labels directly via the app, it seems to me that the susceptibility to errors when allocating harvest quantities is very low”
How can you benefit from Farmable in your orchard?
- Map the field you are harvesting from in the Farmable App
- Record your harvest production easily from your cell phone
- Print labels on the go with a low cost, handheld label printer.
Labels for harvest bins can be created and printed, including all key data points such as field, apple variety, and harvest date. Each label also includes a QR code that can be scanned to retrieve even more detailed information about the harvest and the batch. This simplifies traceability and provides a level of detail that is essential for managing large-scale operations.
For farm managers, the benefits of this feature are clear: with access to all relevant information, they can ensure that each bin is handled correctly, reducing the risk of mix-ups or errors.
A team member on Jan’s farm explains,: “I can print it directly and flexibly with every harvest record and don’t have to print anything on a PC or change templates.”
A Total Harvest Solution for $500
On Jan’s farm, he purchased a Brother Thermal Label Printer for $299, but you can find wireless label printers on Amazon starting at $100. Throw in an extra $50 for labels and your Farmable Pro subscription for $3999 USD. All in, you can radically simplify harvest management and save a lot of stress for about $500 USD.
Whether you want to start using Farmable in tomorrow’s harvest or start planning for next season, you can get started in a few minutes by downloading the Farmable App.
Find it in your app store and try it for free.