586 REPORT OF THE COMMISSIONER OF AGRICULTURE. 



tatioii facilities, it follows that tlie vicinity of tlic larjjcr seaport cities, 

 whose comnicrcial rehitions with the Noi tli sufiicc to s:;ui)j)ort ri'<;ul;ir 

 aud frequent steamship communications, must olfer the best locations 

 for truck farming'. Here the public livery, tiade, dray, and street rail- 

 road, and the private stables, as well as the scavenger departments, 

 ^njjply large (jnantities of manure. The greater the ])ro\imity to the 

 city tiie better will also be the labor supply. Increase ot distance in- 

 volves not only loss of time at every communication between the i';uu) 

 and the city or the point of shipment, but ])ossibly more or less damage 

 to the i)roduce by the shaking and Jolting of wagon transj)ortation. It is 

 for this reason mainly that locations further removed may be profitably 

 made available on the banks of rivers or streams, where water trans- 

 liortatiou may be effected. If truck farming could be confined to these 

 favorable locations, all the truck grown could command better prices, 

 the average returns would be larger, and the business would be moie 

 remunerative, both to grower and consignee. This would obtain not so 

 much in consequence of the smaller aggregate of producers^ but on ac- 

 count of its superior quality when grown under favorable auspices, and 

 not after having been subjected to injury attendant upon longer trans- 

 portation. It is invariably the result that truck of poor quality tends 

 to depress the market, whatever may be the quantity of stock on hand 

 at the time. It is for this reason that along the line of the Savannah, 

 Floridaand Western Railroad, trending south from Savannah, very little 

 crate stuil is grown. 



The wonderl'ully favorable climate of Florida for the growing of early 

 iruit and vegetables with tlie least expenditure of care and money, in- 

 cites and enables her farmers to compete with those at nearer and other- 

 wise more favorable points, but even then they are restricted to the 

 smaller choice of the best-carrying articles. Even shipments of these 

 often arrive at destination in such terribly bad order as not only to be 

 total losses to the grower, but to damage other stock with which they 

 are sometimes stowed on shipboard. I have, for instance, seen Florida 

 tomatoes afthe wharves of the Ocean Steamship Company in Savannah 

 awaiting shipment to Kew York, already in such terribly decayed con- 

 dition that the juice was dripping out of the packages in sufficient 

 quantity to form little puddles on the flooring of the wharf. 



Finally, cotton planters along the lines of the various railroads have 

 attempted truck farming as an adjunct to their regular and more im- 

 portant operations, as a rule, however, with disastrous resultvS, simply 

 because nearly all the conditions essential to success were absent. It 

 may be that small returns for crops grown under such circumstances 

 and received at a season when cash is most acceptable wouhl content 

 the cotton planter. We are taught in truck farming, as in all other 

 pursuits, either by our own experience or that of others, to utilize to the 

 oest advantage ail the means and conditions essential to success, so as to 

 make the most of opportunities, leaving nothing to chance or accident ; 

 but most of the cotton i)lauters who embarked in truck farming ignored 

 all the teachings of experience of others and, therefore, courted failure 

 by attempting to produce these special crops with ridiculously inade- 

 quate manuring, a total want of knowledge in growing, harvesting, 

 handling, packing, and marketing them, and without convenient trans- 

 portation facilities. 



It may be remembered that during the summer of 1881 severe drought 

 prevailed over all the ISTorthern and Northwestern States, cutting short 

 such crops of vegetables, among others, as are stored for winter use. The 

 domestic stock of beets, carrots, turnips, cabbages, and potatoes became, 



