REPORT OF STATE HORTICULTURIST. 63 



course is way above the average for many small children do 

 good work at this employment. For this reason large families 

 make a fine wage during the berry season. The average daily 

 picking must be about 2 1-2 to 3 bushels per person. The total 

 crop for this season is estimated as 80,000 bushels, so that there 

 must be somewhere betw^een 1200 and 1500 people on the bar- 

 rens during the picking season of five weeks. 



The pickers are paid in many cases this year 56c per bushel, 

 while some dry seasons, approaching the last of the picking, 

 they get as high as $1.00 a bushel. This year something like 

 $45,000.00 must have been paid to the pickers alone. 



At the factory the work of canning is practically the same 

 in all of the towns. The teams drive up to a raised platform 

 where the boxes are unloaded and the berries passed directly 

 through another winnowing machine or fanning mill. They 

 are then poured on to tables where they are carefully inspected 

 by women who stand on either side of the table and pick out 

 all foreign material. Next the berries are emptied into the 

 cookers, which are very similar to the corn cookers used in the 

 corn canning plants. The one which is claimed to do the best 

 work is a long steam jacketed cylinder about eight inches in 

 diameter, within which is a long rod having the shape of a 

 screw. This screw turns as the berries are poured in and keeps 

 them in motion until they drop out the other end of the cylin- 

 der. The temperature within this cooker is kept up to 175° F 

 to 200° F and it is estimated that the berries do not remain in 

 it over 3 to 4 minutes when all is going well. 



From the cooker the material is run into large vats so con- 

 structed that men can work on either side and dip the berries 

 into cans and in the act of dipping keep the material of a uni- 

 form quality as far as proportion of berries and juice is con- 

 cerned. Thes.e cans are passed along as soon as filled through 

 a groove where they are brushed clean and presented to the 

 machine which caps and seals them the same as is done in com 

 canneries. The hot cans are immediately transferred to the 

 cooling platform where they are piled in tiers and washed 

 down with cold water. 



They are allowed to dry and then are labeled and packed in 

 boxes ready for shipment. In some canneries sugar is added 

 to the berries as they are canned and where this is done it is 



