not pick the pods from the vines as soon
as they are dug, and cure the peanuts on scaffolds, or elsewhere, and
cure the vines on the ground, like hay?

We answer, because the pods cure better in the shock than in any other
way. They get dry sooner, and make heavier and brighter peanuts than
could possibly be the case, were they gathered at once, and spread, even
in very thin layers, on scaffolds to dry. Besides, as rain on the pods
when they are about half cured, or during the process of curing, would
be very harmful, it is found best to protect the pods by covering them
in shock. They can get more air in shock than if spread on a scaffold,
and a free circulation of air about them is important. A scaffold close
enough to hold the pods would exclude the air in every direction, except
from above. When shocks are put up well, the pods are very effectually
protected, except a few on the top, and in about ten days are cured nice
and bright, and ready to be picked off. The shocks may remain in the
field many weeks, subject to repeated rains, without material injury. Of
course rains of several days continuance would damage the peanuts more
or less. It is best therefore, on this account, and because of the
numerous depredators that prey upon the crop while it remains in the
field, to house it as soon as sufficiently cured to render it certain
the pods will not heat and spoil when in bulk.

=Depredators.=--The creatures of the animal kingdom that levy their tax
on the unwilling planter, and come in for a share--and often a large
share--of the peanut crop, are of many kinds, and numerous in all. Of
quadrupeds, the deer, fox, raccoon, squirrel, and sometimes even the
dog, are more or less destructive; the raccoon, squirrel, and fox are
particularly so, beginning their inroads early in the fall by scratching
up the immature pods, and continuing their thefts daily and nightly as
long as any remain in the field. In some localities, these animals are
exceedingly annoying, and occasion great loss unless their depredations
can be checked.

Next to the animals named, birds are most destructive, while the peanuts
are in shock. Such birds as the blue-jay, crow, partridge, yellow
hammer, wild turkey, and blackbird, coming, as some of them do, not
singly, but in companies and flocks of hundreds and thousands at a time,
carry off vast quantities, unless the planter is always on the alert,
gun in hand, ready to meet them at every turn. Near