Avoiding Ant Bites When Fruit Picking - Part 2

(This is the continuation of Part 1)
When weaver ants are able to crawl on the fruit picker pole you're using, you can be sure they'll be crawling downwards toward you and bite you. There will be a constant stream of ants that will be on your fingers, hands and arms.

So how do you minimize, if not prevent weaver ants from using the mango fruit picker pole as a bridge to reach you?

Avoiding Ant Bites When Fruit Picking

Weaver ants are the boon and bane of mango trees. Boon, because they help eradicate some of the pests that eat and destroy the leaves and fruits, thus significantly cutting down the pest management expenses of farmers.

They're a bane, well, because they attack on the farmers when it's time to harvest the mango fruits. And they attack relentlessly. Like an army on a suicide mission, they bite wherever and whenever they fall or crawl on you.

DIY Apple Fruit Picker Pole Rubber Footing

In a recent article, the need for the apple fruit picker pole bottom cap was discussed. The bottom cap was improvised from a bottle cap and worked well in covering the main pole of the fruit picker.

DIY Apple Fruit Picker Pole Bottom Cap

In this series of the Apple Fruit Picker articles, much has been discussed on the the Apple Fruit Picker tool - and for good reason. When harvesting fruits, the apple fruit picking tool functions mainly to grasp, catch and recover the fruit into the fruit basket. The apple fruit picking tool is mounted on the top end of the fruit picker pole.

Thus far, nothing has been discussed on the bottom end of the pole.

DIY Fruit Harvester Picker - Four Prongs

Here's a fun, easy to do DIY project that is an improvement over my previous homemade apple fruit picker tool. I call this the four-pronged fruit harvester picker. That's because instead of the usual two, this fruit picker has four prongs that are almost aligned with each other.

The four prongs of the fruit picker significantly increases the chances to catch fruit. It essentially doubles the area of the "catching area". This is especially useful when the fruits are on the higher branches and the prongs may be difficult to see behind all the upper foliage. At that height, it becomes a hit-or-miss proposition when attempting to pick fruits with a picker that only has two prongs.

Best Homemade Apple Fruit Picker Tool - Part 3

In part 2 of this article, the procedure to fabricate the catching prongs, fruit basket and how they are joined was discussed. This part discusses the creation of the apple fruit picker pole.

Because this apple fruit picker will be transported, the fruit picker pole was designed to be extendable and collapsible. Two poles of 6-foot and 5-foot lengths will be joined to create an 11-foot long apple fruit picker pole. A 2-foot long pipe will serve as a coupling to join the two poles end-to-end.

Best Homemade Apple Fruit Picker Tool - Part 2

In part 1 of this article, the design, materials and tools for a cheap apple fruit picker were discussed. I call it the best homemade apple fruit picker because this DIY project implemented an apple fruit picking tool with old discarded household items and scrap construction materials. The only materials that were purchased are small hardware items like nuts, bolts and washers.

The fruit picking tool can pick not only apples but many other fruits like oranges, grapefruits, mangoes, guavas and other similar-sized fruits. Here are the steps in the procedure to making an inexpensive yet functional and effective apple fruit picking tool.

Best Homemade Apple Fruit Picker Tool

Picking canistel fruits from a nearby tree was so much fun. This, thanks to a homemade fruit picker with net and pole that I fabricated using easily procured materials. One thing lacking in that DIY project though was the pole's length. At around 6 feet high, the apple fruit picker pole wasn't just enough to reach the upper branches of the canistel tree. What's sad is that at the higher branches, the fruits were bigger and riper.

But lengthening the pole by adding pvc pipes (which are easily available) or replacing it with a longer pole may not be the obvious solution. This is because one other thing I noticed is that the fruit picker tool was a bit heavy for the pole. The fruit picker pole would sometimes bend when lowering the fruit picker tool to get the fruits from the net. Now if I extended the pole with the same pvc material, then definitely the longer pole would bend or bow even further.