COLD STORAGE INVESTIGATIONS 135 



to storage as fast as possible. Oftentimes the later harvest season is 

 so cool as to make the delays in storage of very little importance. 



Size. 



The size of the fruit has a direct bearing upon its keeping quali- 

 ties. In placing fruit in cold storage do not select the overgrown 

 specimens. The medium sized fruit keeps much longer. 



The advantage of grading to accurate size before packing, 

 Vvhether in barrels or in boxes, is readily apparent when this fact 

 is considered, as it offers opportunity to sell the larger sizes before 

 they would naturally deteriorate while the smaller sizes may be held 

 for later sales. Mixing sizes in boxes or barrels does not offer this 

 opportunity. 



In our experiments during the season of 1912 and 1913 a box 

 of Rome Beauty apples containing 111 specimens showed 82.8 per 

 cent in good condition and 17.2 per cent decayed on May 27th, while 

 a box of 74 apples of the same variety contained only 45 per cent in 

 good condition and 54 per cent decayed on the same date. 



Jonathan, 200 apples to the box, contained an average of about 

 1 per cent decayed fruit when inspected on May 2 7th, while the same 

 \ariety with 120 apples to tlie box showed an average of nearly 10 

 per cent decayed on the same date. 



AVrap[)ers. 



The fruit wrapper is of use in cold storage in several ways. It 

 prevents, to quite an extent, the bruising which usually results from 

 handling and shipping to the storage plant. Oftentimes bruises from 

 poor packing may be offset by the wrapper. Where fruit is wrapped, 

 if one apple decays, the fruits surrounding it are protected from the 

 disease and are thus prevented from decay. By preventing the escape 

 of moisture from the surface of the apple, the wrapper will, to a lim- 

 ited extent, prevent the shriveling of the fruit. In our experience 

 for several years we have found that the wrapper will delay the 

 appearance of scald on varieties that show this trouble, for quite a 

 period of time, depending somewhat upon the ripeness of the fruit 

 and the variety. It has been stated that scald may be hastened by 

 the wrapper in that it prevents respiration or breathing, leaving the 

 fruit surrounded by a laj'er of poisonous gas, carbon dioxide. While 

 we have no definite data upon this point, our experience, as has been 

 stated, would indicate that the wrapper delays scald rather than 

 hastens it. 



Srald. 



"Apple Scald" is the name applied to a trouble which develops 

 on apples in cold storage especially, and sometimes in common cellar 

 storage. It is a brown discoloration of the skin .which does not 

 injure the flesh of the apple, though rendering it unfit for marketing 



