FRUIT REPORTS FROM OUR DIRECTORS. 



75 



Elmer Lick. 



York, Ontario, Peel, Cardwell and City of 

 Toronto. 



(Division No. 6.) 

 Represented by Elmer Lick, Oshawa. 



Mr. Lick makes a 

 specialty of fruit cul- 

 ture. He has had 

 charge of a large or- 

 chard on his own place 

 for a number of years, 

 and when the Fruit 

 Marks Act was passed 

 by the Dominion 

 Government he was 

 one of the first inspec- 

 tors to be appointed 

 by the Dominion 

 Department of Agri- 

 culture. In this 

 capacity he has had 

 an opportunity of 

 looking into all mat- 

 ters pertaining to the 

 fruit industry, from 

 the cultivation of the 

 soil to the disposing 

 of the products. He, 

 therefore, speaks with authority, and can view the question both 

 from the producers' and commercial standpoint. 



In making: this report I think that the most 

 important statement that can be made is that 

 Division No. 6 has never produced as much 

 fruit of as great value in any previous year. 

 The apple crop, the great staple fruit in most of 

 this division, was large and exceedingly fine in 

 quality. The abundant rain fall of the past 

 three years gave the trees vigor, the favorable 

 weather during blossoming favored fertiliza- 

 tion, the conditions favorable to the develop- 

 ment foscab did not exist to any great extent. 

 The insect pests were not serious, and to finish 

 up with, the weather during the picking and 

 packing season was the best since 1892. 



Waste of Apples. 



Even with all these favorable conditions, and 

 none of them could be better, thousands of bar- 

 rels of finest apples have been wasted. Several 

 reasons have led to this, first the scarcity of 

 labor and its high price ; second, the greatest 

 difficulty on record in securing barrels. The 

 apple packers, in order to secure help, have had 

 to pay up to 20 cents per hour for picking and 

 packing, and in order to secure barrels have had 

 to pay up to 75 cents. The cost of picking, 

 packing, and the barrel has thus been excep- 

 tionally high, averaging some times about $1.00 

 per barrel, and in many cases even more. Un- 

 der the usual conditions of heavy shipments 

 week by week, the price in the English markets 

 would have fallen to such an extent that the 

 apples would have scarcely paid for picking. 

 Many dealers have made money, few have had 

 very much profit during part of the season. If 

 the English fruit crop had been heavy the 

 larger portion of the apples in our section 

 might have better stayed on the trees. Never- 

 theless the fact remains that apples of stand- 

 ard varieties, picked, packed and shippjed in 

 most careful and economical way have netted 

 from $1.25 to $1.50 per barrel for the apples on 



the tree. This, of course, is only where bar- 

 rels had been stored at 35 cents and where pick- 

 ing and packing went on at the same time. 



Co-operation Need&d. 



Many sections have sent in complaints that 

 there was no dealer buying there. Careful in- 

 quiry has shown that in such cases orchards 

 were small, varieties numerous, consequently 

 the cost of packing was high and a very great 

 difficulty in securing cars of two or three varie- 

 ties at one time. If the small orchardist is to 

 get highest price for his apples there must be 

 more co-operation either between the producers 

 or between the producers or between the pro- 

 ducer and dealer. Barrels must be stored early 

 and in a clean place, producer must take more 

 responsibility in regard to picking, packing and 

 drawing to market. 



Plums a Glut. 



In some parts of the district plums were 

 scarcely worth picking. In common with other 

 sections large quantities of plums were allowed 

 to rot for want of a market. Yet we believe 

 that if the producer could have known where to 

 send them that fair prices could have been ob- 

 eained. The distribution of our fruit crop is of 

 vital importance. At several of the Farmers' 

 Institute meetings fruit growing was discussed, 

 fruit institutes were held in several sections, 

 and quite a lively interest shown. 



In his orchard, near Oshawa, last year, Mr. 

 Lick had a large crop of fine apples — about 

 2,100 barrels in all, of No. 1 and No. 2 fruit. He 

 also handled 700 barrels outside of his orchard, 

 packing most of them himself. Altogether Mr. 

 Lick marketed over 1,600 barrels and 3,200 boxes 

 of apples. For fall shipped previous to Novem- 

 ber 1st satisfactory returns have been received. 

 Most of the fruit went to Machester. 



Lincoln, Niagara, Welland, Haldimand and 

 Monl(. 



(Division No. 8.) 

 Represented by E. Morris, Fonthill. 



I have to report that the fruit crop this sea- 

 son has been the most abundant of any year in 

 the history of the Niagara District. Follow- 

 ing a large crop of last year, under ordinary 

 circumstances we should have expected only a 

 moderate yield of the large fruits, but owing to 

 freedom from storms during May all blossoms 

 developed fruit, particularly plums, peaches and 

 cherries, the former being more than the mar- 

 ket could take. 



Plum Pulp. 



In view of the possibility of another such glut, 

 I would like to draw the attention of the society 

 to the fact that there are thousands of tons of 

 plums being shipped annually from Germany 

 and other European countries, to England in the 

 form of pulp to be manufactured into jam. I 



