106 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



els of appels from his dryer, and the New Yorker came out with noth- 

 ing but a check-book in his pocket, and he bought those apples and 

 took them back to New York in barrels and boxes. 



Prof. AVhitten — The question with regard to the gases for keep- 

 ing fruit, so far as we are able to answer it, I can answer it approvingly. 

 It occurred to Dr. Ayeis that he might be able to keep apples from de- 

 caying by exposing them to the fumes of carbon dioxide. For this pur- 

 pose he used some large glass jars ; some of the apples were kept on 

 the show tables until they began to rotten, some were put in jars with 

 gas turned in and gome put into ajar without the gas being turned in. 

 Those that were in gas kept perfectly, except the carbonic acid gas 

 would form in them, while in a very few days those that had not been 

 exposed to the gas had decayed and putrified. After remaining in the 

 gas for three or four months, the carbonic acid gas had formed on them, 

 and they had the smell of vinegar, but there was no decay nor any put- 

 rifying indications at all. He thinks by further experiments he will be 

 able to put apples in air-tight rooms and keep them by exposing them 

 to that gas. This gas can be gotten and compressed in tanks quite 

 cheaply. He said if he were going to try to keep them by that method 

 he would take the apples when entirely good, before any of the tis- 

 sues had been broken at all, or affected ; these apples he did use were 

 in different stages of decay, none of them were perefectly sound. 



Certain it is any way that they will not putrify in that gas. The 

 formaline for keeping fruit is just coming into use, and costs about 

 twenty-five cents a pound. 



We tried some experiments with it last year and we are also trying 

 some this year ; it is particularly fine for keeping grapes, and grapes 

 will keep in that and look almost as natural as the day they were put 

 in, for an indefinite period of time. On the second day of last July, I 

 put some grapes in a solution of about one and one-half per cent, that 

 is, one and one-half pounds to 98* pounds of water, and put some 

 grapes in |^that and today they have their natural appearance, in fact, 

 in the liquid they look better than when dry in the air. I do not know 

 how long they may last, but there is no reason why, corked and sealed 

 up tight, why they shouldn't keep indefinitely. 



This year we are trying all fruits as they come in, in different 

 strengths of the formula. For instance, a strawberry, if put in two per 

 cent solution will cause the color to come out of the strawberry, and 

 in a one per cent solution the color does not come out nearly so much, 

 not enough to speak of, and it is a question whether a solution weak 

 enough to not take out its color will keep them from decaying. Straw- 

 berries turn a little and look a little bit brown and the color comes out 



