154 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



HOW TO PACK PEACHES AND BEAT CALIFORNIA. 



Mr. Morrill: AVe need not fear the competition of California, if we 

 send to market our good fruit in proper shape. Last year I beat the price 

 of California peaches, both white and yellow, sending my largest and best 

 fruits in flat boxes (the southern tomato packages). I did this for dollars, 

 and found it paid first-rate. The fruit was not wrapped, nor was tarletan 

 used, but every peach was in sight and sixty to sixty-eight peaches filled 

 each twenty-pound box. I received $1.75 to $2 for Lewis, in packages 

 which cost fourteen cents each. I sold my culls at the packing- house, for 

 fifty cents per bushel, and there was demand for all I could furnish. It 

 was dollars in my pocket, not to send them to the Chicago market. My 

 seconds were sent in half-bushel baskets. I picked ripe fruit and sent it 

 to St. Cloud, Minn., all right, but it was not pinched nor squeezed, and it 

 reached the consumer without harm. My lowest sales of such fruit was 

 at $1.50 per box and from that up to $2. There was not a day but I got 

 double the California price. 



Several other members spoke in behalf of better methods of jjacking of 

 fruits, some reciting experience which confirmed Mr. Morrill's, and the 

 general sentiment was favorable to reform in this particular. 



ANNUAL REPORT OF SECRETARY. 



Allegan, Mich., Dec. 24, 1894. 



Genilemen of the State Horticultuvcd Society: 



The close of this year finds our society in circumstances in most 

 respects pleasant to contemplate and affording strong hope for future use- 

 fulness and success. Our auxiliary membership has been augmented by 

 the formation of four local societies during the year, those at Charlotte, 

 Covert, Ionia, and Saranac. In three of these the membership equals or 

 exceeds forty each, and they seem to be full of zeal in their work. 

 Including these, there are 18 local or district societies in the state which 

 have held meetings more or less frequently through the year. The Sanilac 

 and Port Huron societies appear to be defunct or nearly so. 



The receipts and disbursements of the year have been as follows: 



Annual memberships $10 00 



Auxiliary societies 82 82 



Interest on life membership fund 143 77 



Balance from last year 44 26 



$280 85 



