REPORT OF STATE HORTICULTURIST. 93 



APPEE SHIPMENTS, I912-I3. 



After several years' trial to estimate the apple crop through 

 data collected from growers in various sections of the state, we 

 decided that such figures as we were able to get together were 

 of little real value in that they were not an actual index of the 

 amount of fruit produced or shipped. In order to find the exact 

 amount of fruit shipped during the season of 1912-13 cards 

 were sent to the agents at the different railroad stations and to 

 the representatives of the different steamship lines asking that 

 they furnish the Department with the monthly shipments at 

 those points from the first of September, 1912, until the first of 

 August, 19 1 3. Replies were received from most of these agents, 

 and the general offices were kind enough to furnish the total 

 amounts shipped over their lines. The following are the data 

 received from them: 



Bangor and Aroostook Railroad 4,160 barrels. 



Boston and Maine Railroad 6,425 " 



Bridgton and Saco River Railroad 26,614 



Canadian Pacific Railroad 38 



Georges Valley Railroad 9,920 



Grand Trunk Railroad 102,634 



Maine Central Railroad 436,137 



Sandy River and Rangeley Lakes R. R. 7,178 



Eastern Steamship Company 25,141 " 



Total shipments 618,247 



Of the local shipments Monmouth heads the list with 24,114 

 barrels ; Auburn was second with 23,868 ; Buckfield was third 

 with 23,020; West Paris, fourth, with 22,181; Norway, fifth 

 with 21,360, and so on down to the towns where only a single 

 barrel was sent. With these figures we have accurate data as 

 a basis from which we can make fairly close estimates of the 

 following crop. It was generally considered that last year''- 

 crop was about 60 per cent of a normal crop, as we term it, so 

 that a normal crop should be in the vicinity of 1,000,000 bar- 

 rels. The present season's crop was not over one-half of that 

 of last year, but inasmuch as prices are much more favorable 

 a larger per cent of the entire crop produced will in all proba- 

 bility be shipped. It is safe to estimate a shipment of 300,000 





