374 STATE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



HARVESTIXG FRUIT. 



A few men iu our State are regularly getting two or three times the usual 

 prices paid for apples because they have won a good name by always taking 

 great care in liarvesting and packing. Every man will likely pursue a course 

 different in some respects from that of every other man. I have the packers 

 use a common grain bag hung over the shoulder. The fruit is carefully emptied 

 into a light cushioned box a few inches high and two by three feet in size. The 

 box is lined with any cheap material, with some fine hay to make it soft on the 

 sides and bottom. This box sits on two light horses about as higli as a barrel. 

 From this box the apples are assorted into two or three grades. 



They are packed headed, and placed in an open barn or under a shed till 

 some time in November. The cellars should be freely ventilated to make them 

 cool in autumn. Keep a thermometer in the cellar and watch it. Ventilate 

 on suitable days to cool the air down to about the freezing point. Keep the 

 ■windows closed on warm days. Two thicknesses of newspaper closely tacked 

 over the windows will be a great help in cold weather to keep the frost out. For 

 the good of the apples in store and for the good of the health of the people in 

 the house, enough attention is not paid to the ventilation of the cellars. With 

 extra fruit line the barrels with paper and place a layer now and then across 

 the barrel. 



LEAEN TO USE MORE TEUIT. 



Many of our farmers were not accustomed to have much good fruit when they 

 were young. They learned how to get along without it. Now fruit is plenty 

 and cheap they should contrive more ways to use it. They should have fruit 

 handy at all suitable times; they should encourage its use in an uncooked con- 

 dition, and also when prepared in a variety of ways. Apples I believe to be 

 wholesome. Even green apples used moderately are not objectionable. 



RAISING FRUIT AS A BUSINESS. 



To make the orchards more profitable our people must give them more atten- 

 tion. It is too often the case that a farmer puts but little labor on his orchard 

 and in autumn he expects, and sometimes finds it to be the most profitable 

 part of his farm. To be more successful he must make more of a business of 

 it. In the long run care, study, and intelligent labor will bring good returns in 

 the orchard as it has in the care of stock, in ditching, good plowing, or select- 

 ing good seed wheat. Our people need to know more of the habits of insects, 

 more of animal and vegetable physiology, more of chemistr}^, mechanism, politi- 

 cal economy, and more of everything in the line of an education, not only to 

 make them good citizens, but to enable them to get better returns for their 

 labor. We need to become familiar with what has already been discovered and 

 become well established, and we need still more to see the importance and profit 

 in doing things according to the most approved methods. 



As our country grows older extra care will probably produce better fruit. On 

 account of the greater competition the raiser of poor fruit will find it unprofit- 

 able and quit the business. The proper management of each variety will be 

 better understood. Slip-shod pioneer farming is fast ceasing to be profitable, 

 at least in southern Michigan. Brain work with hand work, study with prac- 

 tice will take the ascendancy and occupy the field?, the orchards, and the 

 gardens. 



