FARMERS' INSTITUTE. 217 



Onions, 58,300 bushels, at 65 cents $37,895 00 



Other vegetables valued at 100,000 00 



Total* - $1,901,960 07 



From the most reliable information I could get, the following is the num- 

 ber of acres in bearing orchards, in small fruits, and market gardening: 

 Peach, 12,000; apples, 38,000; small fruits, 68,000; commercial gardening, 

 7,000 ; total, 63,000. Total number of acres in the three counties, 1,284,655. 



Thus we have about one-twentieth of the land in orchards, small fruits, and 

 market gardening; or for the crop of 1887 (taking out the orchards which 

 bore little or no fruit, the loss of small fruits and vegetables by drouth) it is 

 probably a safe estimate that the above yields came from about 40,000 acres, 

 or one-thirtieth of the area of these three counties. This gives a hint of the 

 possibilities of increasing our orchards and gardens, after making liberal 

 allowance for land unfit for either. 



The above values are given as the amounts realized at station or dock, as 

 up to that point the money paid out for raising, harvesting, and for packages 

 is mainly within the counties. The above figures do not include the home 

 consumption of fruit of the 23,000 families within these counties, whether 

 used fresh, dried, canned, preserved, in apple butter, jellies, or the many 

 other forms of keeping fruit beyond its natural life. 



It will be observed that the most money is realized from the apple. To 

 emphasize the importance of the apple crop, compare it with the wheat crop, 

 which is the principal money crop of the farmer. The State crop report for 

 October, 1887, places the yield of these three counties at 1,563,969 bushels. 

 Deducting 575,000 bushels for bread and seed (five bushels to each of the 

 115,000 of population), and we have 983,969 bushels for sale, which at 73 cents, 

 the average price for the year, gives us $721,947.37, or $131,416.83 less than 

 the apple crop. 



For universal consumption by all classes the apple is the king of fruits. 

 For the money invested and the time spent it gives larger returns than any 

 other crop of orchard or farm. 



I have attempted to deal only with the commercial phases of fruit growing 

 and gardening. As already stated, few realize the magnitude of these interests 

 or the money value to the State. 



The continuous annual crop of the peach and other tender sorts of fruits, 

 for more than a quarter of a century, has demonstrated our climatic advan- 

 tages. The lake furnishes a natural thoroughfare, with the most perfect re- 

 frigerating surroundings, across which these products can be taken in a night, 

 thus making distance of little consequence ; or in other words, we are the con- 

 ■^nient suburbs of the cities of Chicago, Eacine, Milwaukee, and other ports 

 ■with their network of railroads reaching out through the west and northwest 

 to hundreds of cities and villages of growing demands. And this increasing 

 demand is occasioned not only by doubling of populations, but through the 

 lessening home production of tender fruits, caused in the main by the destruc- 

 tion of the great forests of Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Manitoba, which have 

 been to the Mississippi valley in the past what the great lakes are for Michigan 

 — the modifying barrier to arctic cold. Fortunately for us, man can not destroy 

 the lakes. 



*[ After this paper was read Mr. Monroe received additional reports of 78,855 baskets of peaches 

 and 31,440 barrels of apples. Market garden shipments were also increased, by personal reports made 

 daring the institute, to something over $300,000, this mainly from Benton Harbor and St. Joseph.] 



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