228 State Horticultural Society. 



the ground after they have become fully matured, but if these fallen 

 apples are quickly picked up and put in piles on the shaded side 

 of the tree, or some other cool place, where they can be protected 

 by covering from the sunshine, and where they can be exposed to 

 the cool night, by ventilation or by the removal of the covering, 

 they will perhaps keep fairly well. After the cool frosty nights 

 have come, and there might be some danger of freezing, the apples 

 may be gathered from the trees and placed in piles or bulk in the 

 coolest place obtainable. Apples generate heat when stored, and if 

 the bulk is too large, this generated heat will help along the ripen- 

 ing process. If the apples are piled out of doors and covered to 

 keep out the heat and sunshine, the covering should be removed 

 at night, and if they are stored in a house, the doors and windows 

 should be opened at night, and, if possible, a draft of cool air 

 forced through the building and fruit by a fan or some other 

 process. 



A safe rule to follow is to always ventilate the fruit when the 

 air is cooler than the fruit, until the outside air reaches a tem- 

 perature low enough for there to be danger of freezing the fruit. 

 A house might be kept cool to a certain extent with ice, but if you 

 are depending on the railroad to bring you your ice, you might 

 need ice sometimes a long time before you could get it. At this 

 season of the year the nights are usually much cooler than the 

 ordinary temperature of the earth near the surface, which has had 

 little time to cool since subjected to the intense heat of summer; 

 consequently, a cellar is not usually a good place to store apples 

 at packing time. Cellars are often poorly ventilated, and may con- 

 tain many germs of disease which readily attack the fruit. 



Cool nights that reach a temperature of 27 to 28 degrees 

 will not damage the fruit if that temperature is only of short du- 

 ration, but the ripening process is hastened when the warm sun- 

 shine follows. 



If possible, avoid handling ripe apples when they are very 

 warm; they damage more, and all damage develops into loss or 

 decay very rapidly. In this latitude a light covering will usually 

 protect the apples that are out of doors from damaging cold un- 

 til near midwinter. 



Apples will keep better in open packages when in common 

 storage, and after they become soft they should be moved only to 

 go guickly into consumption. Sometimes when we have good, firm 

 apples, if the season be usually cool, like this season has been, 

 perhaps the loss in common storage will be comparatively small, 



