10 Report of State Board of Horticulture. 



t 



About 125 cars of green prunes were shipped fi'om Salem, 

 Corvallis, Dundee, and Eugene. 



The experiment was also tried of shipping cherries from 

 Salem and Eugene, and, as with the prunes, while the prices 

 received were not what it was hoped to obtain, still it gives 

 good promise of success for the future. 



The experience of others in the shipment of f resh fruits 

 shows that some System of cooling the fruit before loading is 

 an absolute necessity for successful handling of all the more 

 perishable varieties. When loaded at once into the iced car 

 and started on its journey there is not sufficient Ventilation 

 to carry off the moisture and it condenses and falls back upon 

 the top layers and the result is a large percentage of spoiled 

 fruit. 



By the use of a pre-cooling device, of which there are now 

 several successful ones patented, a strong blast of cold air can 

 be forced through the fruit for several hours before shipment 

 and all the surplus moisture removed, and the fruit made to 

 carry many days longer in good condition. 



Every fruit growers' union in the State should investigate 

 this matter and prepare to install such a plant before next 

 season. Then, with great care in the selection of the fruit to 

 be packed I am sure we can send our berries, cherries, prunes, 

 and pears to any market in the United States. 



When in Washington last June I called upon the officials of 

 the Department of Agriculture and requested their help in 

 this matter of the preparation of green fruit for shipment, 

 and was promised the service of an expert for next season 

 provided we could get our congressmen to secure a small 

 appropriation extra for that purpose. Mr. G. Harold Powell 

 of the Department of Horticulture, who has this work in his 

 immediate Charge, was then just on the point of leaving for 

 a trip to the Puyallup Valley, Washington, for the purpose of 

 investigating the shipment of raspberries and blackberries 

 from that district, and I asked that he at least stop at Salem 

 long enough to meet with the officials of the union there. This 

 he did some weeks later and was able to give them some 

 assistance of value and the promise of füll co-operation in 

 future. 



This is a point that we must follow up and render every 

 assistance in our power to get fully established, for the success 

 of our green fruit shiDments is absolutely essential to our füll 

 development as a fruit-producing State. 



There is every indication of an enormous increase in the 

 acreage of orchard to be planted this Coming season ; this 

 means many trees and as the home supply is not large great 



