When you look at the unopened pod of the peanut, you can see that it closely resembles the pea or bean. In fact, it belongs to the same family. The peanut plant is a bush, and its blossoms resemble those of the pea.

After the petals fade, a part of the pod elongates very greatly and its tip becomes buried in the soil. There this tip enlarges and the seeds mature. So if you want to gather peanuts, you have to dig them out of the soil!

Where did peanuts come from? Probably the original home of the peanut was South America. It is a very ancient plant. In prehistoric graves in Peru, peanuts have been found along with pottery decorated with peanut designs! From there it was probably transplanted to Africa, and then to the United States.

Today the peanut is raised in the southern United States from Florida to California and as far north as Washington, D.C. It is also cultivated in Latin America, Asia, and Africa. Common varieties of peanuts are the large-podded, red-skinned Virginia peanuts, and the smaller Spanish and North Carolina types.

Peanuts need a long, frost-free season to grow well. The peanut plant can survive long dry periods, and it is a profitable crop, yielding an average of 100 to 150 hecto- litres per hectare.

Peanuts are planted late in the spring, and are dug by machinery before the frost comes. After the vines are dried, the peanuts are picked by machine. Sometimes hogs are turned directly into the fields to root out the nuts.

You enjoy peanuts as peanut butter, salted or roast nuts, and in candy bars. But peanuts have many other uses. Their oil is used in salads, vegetable shortenings, soaps, and oleomargarine. Peanut meal feeds hogs and cattle. Other products include dyes, printing inks, and rubber substitutes.