No. 6. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 223 



to handle, care for, pack and dispose of the products of his labor. 

 This seems to be the one weak point with the majority of farmers. 

 They think if they produce the goods their task is done, and it is 

 the other fellow's duty to come and pay good prices for their 

 goods and carry them away, and because the looked-for-customer 

 fails to materialize, they decry the business as unprofitable, and 

 give their attention to other branches requiring less energy and 

 brain power. 



I have a friend who has a large orchard and raises abundance 

 of fruit, but who unfortunately must have been born in the sign 

 of the Crab. He is so slow he never gets ready to do a thing until 

 it is too late. It is then put off until next season, when the same 

 thing is repeated. His apples are never picked until after the 

 finest ones have fallen; the balance are then picked in bags, poured 

 on heaps on the ground. The best windfalls are also picked up 

 and put with them, there to be left until cold weather compels 

 their removal. Many are over ripe; all are more or less injured by 

 heat, cold, rain, etc. They are then hauled home on springless 

 wagons, placed in a warm cellar, or put with little or no sorting 

 into any old package, such as cement, fish or oyster barrels, and 

 either sent to market or to cold storage until the market wants 

 them. They are then sent to the commission man, and he, poor 

 fellow, has an awful mess of it. Old moldy, filthy barrels, with con- 

 tents unsorted, all smeary and moldy, some rotten, others scabby 

 and worm eaten, unfit for anything but the dump pile; and yet 

 he expects to get the highest market quotations. He watchea the 

 market prices, sees that good apples are bringing fo.OO per barrel. 

 When his returns come in and he finds his fruit sold for .|1.50 to 

 12.00 per barrel, ho accuses the commission man of dishonesty. 

 This is no fairy story, but the actual conditions under which three- 

 fourth of the farmers' apples are marketed. 



Is it different with the peaches? Not a bit; they receive the same 

 careless handling and marketing. People do not think, they use 

 no judgment. Last year a farmer came to my orchard for two 

 baskets of peaches; he brought a bag to put them in. He was 

 going to haul them four miles on top of a load of coal on a wagon 

 without springs. I refused to put them in the bags, but gave him 

 the baskets, but told him they would be unfit for use, as a bruised 

 peach is worthless for canning, but he took them. The next day 

 he came back for others, saying his wife refused to put them up. 

 This time he came in a light spring wagon. 



The first essential to successful marketing is to have the fruit 

 carefully picked, handling it with the utmost care, nicely graded, 

 running uniform in size throughout the package, as a few imperfect 

 or small specimens greatly reduce the price. Then the package 

 is a very important factor. It should be new, bright and clean, of 

 suitable size and attractive. Many think this makes no difference, 

 it being the fruit and not the package that makes the price. This 

 is a mistake; that which is most attractive sells quickest. Look 

 at the poor miserable Ben Davis apple; it sells at higher prices 

 than many better varieties, but less taking to the eye, merely be- 

 cause of its beautiful exterior. 



Then the size of package should be considered. Maryland and 

 Delaware use the five-eighth basket. Pennsylvania peach growers 



