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US 4,472,929 AGranted
Mushroom harvester
OwnerCathal MacCanna, Peter Van den Boschinventors
Life of this patent
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Abstract
The present invention provides a compact mushroom harvester which utilizes a relatively short blade adapted to oscillate horizontally in an arcuate manner and move laterally and longitudinally over the bed, thereby allowing selected mushrooms or small groups of mushrooms to be picked individually. The picked mushrooms are transferred from the bed, preferably by a vacuum article transfer device.
Claims3
A harvester for selectively harvesting individual mushrooms or clumps thereof from a growing bed, said harvester comprising:
- a housing adapted to be situated above a mushroom crop growing on said bed;
- a shaft projecting downwardly from said housing and connected in driven relation to an oscillatory drive means mounted on said housing;
- means located on said housing and adapted to permit said shaft to be moved laterally to and fro across the width thereof;
- means located on said housing and adapted to permit said shaft to be moved longitudinally back and forth along the length thereof;
- an elongated, double-edged blade of about one to four inches in length, secured directly to said shaft and extending radially outwardly therefrom, said blade being adjustably oriented in a cutting plane substantially parallel to a reference plane including a top surface of said bed wherein said drive means is operable to drive said blade through said shaft in an oscillating, arcuate manner in said cutting plane;
- means mounted on said housing for adjusting the height of said blade relative to said reference plane whereby said blade may be raised from said cutting plane to a height above said crop;
- and
- means for collecting mushrooms reaped from said bed.
5 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.