348 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



Mr. Baldwin : I would like to have some one give his experi- 

 ence with the folding box. 



Mr. Hawkins: I never tried them. I always buy my boxes 

 ready made. 



Mr. Baldwin : I used about 2,000 of them. The quart boxes 

 worked pretty well, but the pint boxes did not hold their shape very 

 well. 



Mr. Brackett : I think it is a good plan to have a small stock on 

 hand in case you run out of boxes. It is hard to keep boxes in stor- 

 age. It is a good thing to have a few to fall back on in case you run 

 out. 



Mr. Wright : The folding box is a new thing and perhaps has not 

 yet had a sufficient trial. It is made of spruce wood, which dries out 

 very quickly and by the time we come to use it it has shrunk con- 

 siderably. If they are wet a little after the bottom is put down it 

 will stay there. Put them in water and soak them for fifteen min- 

 utes or half an hour, and then let them dry out and you will find 

 they are perfect. You will find very little trouble with the bottom 

 coming out. 



Mr. A. D. Barnes (Wis.) : Is the .Fruit Growers' Association 

 confining itself to any particular kind of box? 



Mr. Hawkins : No, we have not yet adopted anything from 

 what we have been using. 



Mr. Wright : Out at Excelsior we use the deep box entirely. 

 We never use the Illinois box at all. 



Mr. Barnes : In central and northern Wisconsin that is the box 

 we are trj'ing to adopt. 



Mr. J. H. Shephard : Last winter I introduced a bill in the legis- 

 lature regulating the size of boxes to be used to conform to the size 

 of the Michigan box. There was quite a little discussion in regard 

 to the box. I found the commission men of Minneapolis, St. Paul 

 and Duluth wanted no law governing the size of the boxes. I think 

 we ought to have a uniform size of box through the country for 

 strawberries and raspberries. As it is now, they can send in under- 

 sized boxes from outside of Minnesota and undersell us. For in- 

 stance, they send raspberries in here from Washington in what they 

 claim to be quart boxes, but they only hold seven-tenths of a quart, 

 yet they sell for the same price as our full quarts. We have had to 

 sell them in pints. I found after the introduction of the bill that 

 every commission man in Minnesota was fighting the bill, and I 

 think this association should take the matter up next winter and en- 

 deavor to secure a uniform size for boxes. I also introduced a bill 

 to prohibit the use of boxes a second time. I found the same appo- 

 sition and from the same source. This matter should be taken up 

 by your association and by the state board of health. It is not health- 

 ful to use the boxes a second time. They are full of microbes and 

 bacteria and are not fit to use a second time. 



