1893 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



443 



High-pressure Gardening. 



BY A. I. ROOT. 



PUTTING UP CANNED FRUITS AND VEGETA- 

 BLES FOR MARKET. 



HOW FAR IS IT PRACTICABLE FOR MARKET-GAR- 

 DENERS AND BERRY-GHOWERS TO PUT UP 

 THEIR OWN SURPLUS? 



So many have written, inakinsr inquiries in 

 regard to this matter, I have decided to tell you 

 what I know about it. One great obstacle in 

 the way is, that it puts " too many irons in the 

 fire" for the average gardener or fruit-grower. 

 He may be a man of such ability that he could 

 do very well as fruit-grower, as market-garden- 

 er, or as a canner. if he were to undertake either 

 one of the three alone; whereas, if he should 

 undertake to do two. or, worse still, three of 

 them, at once, his energies and abilities would 

 be so divided that one and may be all three 

 would suffer. You know friend Terry's great 

 point has been in attempting one thing, and in 

 doing that one thing well. Mr. Terry is a farm- 

 er; but he has chosen, as his branch of farming, 

 the growing of potatoes only. Of course, he 

 grows clover and wheat also, but they are only 

 secondary. Now, in order that he may have 

 full swing on potatoes, and nothing to divert 

 his interest and attention, and the same of his 

 hired help, he has discarded even pigs and 

 chickens, and, for the most part, the family gar- 

 den; and he succeeds, and is not cramped or 

 worried in succeeding. If you undertake to 

 can your surplus to keep it from spoiling, you 

 will likely be cramped or worried, and wish you 

 had never thought of it. If, however, you have 

 a grown-up family that would like to help, and 

 stay around home, or near the old homestead, 

 then it may be well to undertake it. Friend 

 Cummins has four boys, all grown-up men, and 

 I should say they are all of rather unusual abil- 

 ity. But even with all this help and unusual 

 facilities he does very little in the way of rais- 

 ing his own tomatoes or corn or pumpkins, if I 

 am correct. He grows tomato-pJmit?, but he 

 does it mainly that he may have nice plants, 

 the right variety, and no mistakes, and have 

 them at just the right time. Then he depends 

 upon the farming community to furnish the 

 product to run his canning-factory. 



Well, let us see what we can do. Perhaps 

 you raise tomatoes for market. Tomatoes have 

 a good many ups and downs. They are liable to 

 be worth a dollar a bushel, or more; and, again, 

 they are liable, on very short notice, to be so 

 plentiful that you had better take 20 cts. a bush- 

 el for them than to let them rot on the ground. 

 If you push your whole product on the market, 

 and try to force sales, you not only damage 

 yourself, but your neighbors. In fact, we often 

 keep the market up to .50 or 75 cts. by telling our 

 customers that, if we can not get that price, we 

 shall take them home and can them. 



I need not stop to tell you any thing about 

 canning them for home use in glass jars. We 

 put up a good many that way every year, for 

 our lunch-room. Sometimes we sell them 

 around town. Where we want to save a lot of 

 tomatoes from spoiling, or from glutting the 

 market, two-quart cans iue cheaper than any 

 smaller size. The only truuble is. a smnll fami- 

 ly may not be able to use up a two-quart can 

 before it spoils, after opening; so if you are go- 

 ing to use glass cans, better have part of them 

 one-quart to accommodate. Tomatoes in glass, 

 if properly put up, shouM keep any number of 

 years. The trouble is, a ^cood many people can 

 not be made to do it right. Many a good house- 



wife, however, can tell you all about it; but 

 somebody must superintend it who is interested. 

 The average hired help will not take the pains 

 necessary to make a sure thing of having every 

 can keep. 



Now, then, if you have too many tomatoes to 

 put into glass, you will ilant to put them in reg- 

 ular standard tin cans so they can compete in 

 the market with the product of the gri'at can- 

 ning-factories. As a rule, I do not believe you 

 can do i.t to pay unless you put up a factory, and 

 do it on a large scale. The trouble is, two- 

 pound cans of tomatoes are often sold at from 

 90 cts. to $1.00 a dozen. This would be 7 or 8 cts. 

 each. The average tinsmith will charge you 4 

 cts. each for your cans; and you can not put in 

 the tomatoes, and solder them up, for much less 

 than 4 cts. more. You can try if if you want to; 

 hut I think you will '"get left.'" If tomatoes 

 are selling, as they are doing just now, at 11.35 

 a dozen, so that you get 10 cts. or more per can, 

 you can very likely do it, especially if you have 

 a family of children who want something to do. 

 Girls and boys work nicely together at this sort 

 of work. 



The first thing is to get the cans. You can 

 buy tops and bottoms by the barrel for about 

 IK cts. per can. The piece of tin for the body, 

 and the work in making up the can, will cost 

 you about as much more; so you can not very 

 well make the cans for less than 3 cts.; and un- 

 less you make a good many of them they will 

 cost you 4 and may he 5. Now. here comes an 

 illustration of just what I want to teach. 

 There are great factories that will make cans 

 by the carload, all complete, for about 2 1-2 cts. 

 each, or as low as you can buy the materials, to 

 say nothing of the work. Friend Cummins has 

 some of the nicest automatic machinery in the 

 would, the resultof years of stuiiy and labor, and 

 much expense; but he told me these factories 

 for making cans had worked the thing down so 

 fine that, if it were not for the freight on such 

 bulky goods, he would stop trying to make his 

 own cans, letting all his expensive machinery 

 lie idle, and buy them by the carload. One oth- 

 er advantage in making his own is this: He can 

 always be sure of having cans ready when fa- 

 vorable weather gives a great crop of tomatoes. 

 Waiting for a carload, or for a train of cars 

 loaded with cans, during the height of the sea- 

 son, would be rather bad business for a canning- 

 factory. So you see there are several things to 

 consider. Perhaps I might say. for the encour- 

 agement of those who would really like to make 

 their own cans, that there is quite a room for 

 enterprise and skill in this matter. I have men- 

 tioned to you the incident of can-making in 

 California, when they had a large shipment of 

 honey to go to England, to put up in tins. 

 Friend Wilkin hired the best tinsmiths he 

 could find, and the most expert men in soldering 

 cans; but his own son in-law, J. E\ Mclntyre, 

 at that time but a boy, after a few days' prac- 

 tice and intelligent study of the whole matter, 

 put up more cans, and did them well, than any 

 old tinner they could get hold of. I do not 

 know but our young friend had his eye on the 

 boss's nice-looking smart daughter at about 

 that time. Such things are sometimes a power- 

 ful incentive; and it is all right too. 



Now about putting up the fruit. I do not 

 know very much about the way canning-facto- 

 ries work. Circumstances, perhaps, must de- 

 cide something in regard to this matter. Two 

 years aso we put up about 3000 cans of toma- 

 toes. Most of them we raised; but when great 

 "beauties" (they were Livingston's Beauty) 

 were offered in market for only 30 cts. a bushel, 

 we decided to buy them and can them. Had it 

 not been for the advance in canned tomatoes 

 this spring, I do not know how we should have 



