EXPERIMENTS IN PEAR STORAGE. 19 



designed for a first-class trade. For the late varieties the wrapper 

 presents the same advantages, and has an additional value in increas- 

 ing the commercial life of the fruit. It is especially efficient, if the 

 package is not tight, in lessening the wilting. 



THE INFLUENCE OF COLD STORAGE ON THE FLAVOR AND AROMA OF 



THE FRUIT. 



There is a general impression that cold storage injures the delicate 

 aroma and characteristic flavors of fruits. In this publication the 

 most general statements only can be made concerning it, as the subject 

 is of a most complicated nature, not well understood, and involving a 

 consideration of the biological and chemical processes within the fruit 

 and of their relation to the changes in or to the development of the 

 aromatic oils, ethers, acids, or other products which give the fruit its 

 individuality of flavor. 



It is not true that all cold-storage fruits are poor in quality. On the 

 contrary, if the storage house is properly managed the most delicate 

 aromas and flavors of many fruits are developed and retained for a 

 long time. The quality of the late fall and winter apples ripened in 

 the cold-storage house is equal to that of the same varieties ripened 

 out of storage, and the late pears usually surpass in quality the same 

 varieties ripened in common storage. 



The summer fruits, like the peach, the Bartlett pear, and the early 

 apples, lose their quality very easily, and in an improperly managed 

 storage house may have their flavors wholly destroyed. Even in a 

 room in which the air is kept pure the flavor of the peach seems to 

 be lost after two weeks or more, while the fruit is still firm, much as 

 the violet and some other flowers exhale most of their aromatic proper- 

 ties before the flowers begin to wilt. 



It is probable that much of the loss in quality may be attributed to 

 overmaturity, brought about by holding the fruit in storage beyond 

 its maximum time; but it should be remembered that the same change 

 takes place in fruits that are not ripened in cold storage, the aroma 

 and fine flavor often disappearing before the fruit begins to deteriorate 

 materially in texture or appearance. 



On the other hand, it is certain that the quality of stored fruits may 

 be injuriously affected by improper handling or by the faulty manage- 

 ment of the storage rooms. Respiration goes on rapidly when the 

 fruit is warm. If placed in an improperly ventilated storage room, 

 in which odors are arising from other products stored in the same 

 compartment or in the same cycle of refrigeration, the warm fruit 

 may absorb these gases and become tainted by them, while the same 

 fruit, if cool when it enters the storage room, will breathe much less 

 actively, and there will be less danger of injury to the quality, even 



