I04 



THE CANADIAN HORTICULTURIST 



April, 1914 



Nova Scotia Fruit Growers Face the Future 



AT the annual convention of the Nova 

 Scotia Fruit Growers' Association, 

 held in January, President S. C. Par- 

 kf-r of Berwick, discussed frankly the 

 work of the year and the prospects for 

 the future. As his remarks were of more 

 than usual interest, we srive them here al- 

 most in full. Mr. Parker spoke as follows : 

 We are R-athered to-day to review the 

 successes and failures of the past year, to 

 look into the present situation, and to con- 

 sider what can be done in the futurei to 

 place our business on a better basis. The 

 results of the past year have been far from 

 satisfactory. We had our chance and failed 

 to take advantage of it. On the first day 

 of May, 1913, this Valley had a chance to 

 make good. We had a good show of blos- 

 soms, with a prospect of, at least, a fair 

 crop of apples. We gathered a very mod- 

 erate crop of very poor apples. Nineteen 

 hundred and thirteen was a year, when to 

 make good in apples meant a lot of money 

 and much free advertising of our orchards 

 and their products. The markets of the 

 world were open to us — ^no apple growing 

 section on this continent had a full crop. 



The markets were ready to absorb all 

 good fruit available at a good price. We 

 have not made good, and, in my opinion, 

 this failure is the fault of the fruit grow- 

 ers rather than that of Providence, upon 

 whom too many of us are inclined to put 

 all blame. I know there are hundreds of 

 fruit growers in this Valley, and doubtless 

 some here to-day, who will hasten to dis- 

 pute this assertion. I am prepared to back 

 this statement to the limit. Show me any 

 orchard in the Valley that in the season of 

 1913 grew a few measly barrels of scabby 

 apples, and I will guarantee to find within 

 five miles of this orchard a farmer who, 

 under practically the same conditions with 

 the same environment, had a fair to good 

 crop of comparatively clean apples. I will 

 make another assertion that some may rise 

 to dispute. Thorough spraving will not 

 only make apples grow clean, but it will 

 make apples grow when otherwise there 

 would be none. I can give you concrete 

 proof, and much evidence to this end will 

 be offered before the meeting is dosed 

 And, just now, all will concede that there 

 Y^j"°l-* crop of clean apples in any or- 

 chard this season that was not sprayed in 

 the most thorough manner. 



There is only one salvation for apple 

 growing in this Annapolis Vallev, and that 

 is in the gospel of e-ood spraying. We 

 must grow clean apples— nothing else 

 counts. The grower of spotted apples is 

 certain to grow poor, and the more apples 

 he grows the poorer he will become. Scabby 

 apples will not be worth anvthing in the 

 near future, and the man who grows them 

 will not earn his board. 



Apples can be kept clean even in the 

 worst season, for we have men here to-dav 

 who have succeeded in doing so; and what 

 one has done others may do. 



THE world's crop 



The world's crop of apples for the year 

 1913 was small. Ontario had a small crop, 

 and patchy both in quantity and qualitv 

 Ontario, of course, is a large province and 

 the apple areas are widelv distributed 

 ^K>me sections had good quality and others 

 very spotted; New York and New England 

 had an off year. The crop of the middle 

 umhJT- ^"^P^^t'^'^'y li^ht; British Col- 

 un.bu had the most appks she has ever 



had. The western states had about half of 

 last year's crop. 



THE SHADOW OF OVERPRODUCTION 



It is from the western states that the 

 shadow of overproduction looms large. 

 New York and New England are giving 

 their orchards better care, and improving 

 rapidly in quantity and quality; but the 

 enormous population in the east will take 

 care of an increasingly large quantity! of 

 apples. Ontario this year shipped nearly 

 400,000 barrels to western Canada and that 

 growing country will consume any On- 

 tario surplus, if she can hold the market. 

 The four states of Oregon, Montana, Utah, 

 Washington, produced in 1911, 18,000 car- 

 loads. This year, with an off crop, 10,000 

 carloads. Next year they expect to produce 

 25,000 carloads. This tier of western states 

 is said to have 120,000 acres of orchard 

 just coming into bearing. At 100 barrels 

 per acre, or 300 boxes, as they count them 

 there, we are to face 20,000,000 barrels of 

 apples added to the world's production. 

 That is the problem we are facing, and that 

 is why I say it is useless for us to face that 

 tremendous flood of big, red and yellow 

 apples with a few thousand barrels of 

 miserable spotted trash that is scarcely 

 worthy a place in the cider mill. 



Many of you who keep in touch with the 

 foreign markets, know that two years ago 

 thousands of boxes of Oregon Newtons, the 

 highest priced apple in the world, were sell- 

 ing in Liverpool and London at four shil- 

 lings a box. This is what increased pro- 

 duction may mean ; and that is the reason 

 this Association is calling on all interested 

 to get busy and grow clean apples, and 

 only clean apples in competition for the 

 world's market. 



ORG.ANIZATION NEEDED 



The next step in the fight for supremacy 

 in the struggle, is good organization in 

 marketing. The United Fruit Companies 

 have taken a prominent place in the great 

 selling factors of this country. For an 

 organization in the first year of its history 

 to handle nearly one-half of the output of 

 apples of this province, is certainly a re- 

 markable record. If there had been no 

 central organization to manage the output 

 I am convinced there would have been a far 

 different record, both last year and this. 

 The flood of scabby apples poured on the 

 London market, as without the guiding 

 hand of the central organization would have 

 been the case, must have resulted disas- 

 trously to aU fruit interests. 



I am convinced that one organization, 

 controlling all the export apples of this 

 province, is essential to the best interests 

 of all progress. The United Fruit Company 

 may well feed proud of its record and its 

 work, and this association may certainly be 

 proud of the part it had in effecting the 

 organization. 



BRITISH COLTTMBIA ALERT 



The British Columbia Government sent 

 their Secretary for Agriculture to the head 

 office at Berwick to inquire into the me- 

 thods of organization. British Columbia is 

 organizing cooperative companies, with 

 Government assistance and Government 

 capital. The United Fruit Companies has 

 its present standing without Government 

 grants or Government assistance of any 

 kind. In fact, more than once, the organi- 

 zation has been effected in spite of Legis- 



lative indifference, if not active opposi- 

 tion. 



Your president was invited by the Ontario 

 Fruit Growers' Association to visit their 

 annual meeting in November and address 

 them on Cooperative Marketing in Nova 

 Scotia. I had the honor of giving that 

 association a brief history of the organiza- 

 tion of the United Fruit Companies, in the 

 presence of the Minister of Agriculture and 

 Dr. C. C. James, adviser to the Minister, 

 both of whom expressed a great interest 

 in the work being done in this province. 



In listening for two or three days to the 

 discussion of the Ontario fruit men, I found 

 their problems much the same as ours. 

 Transportation is a big question with them 

 owing to their long rail haul and enormous 

 output of soft fruit. Their troubles cause 

 ours to shrink into insignificance. They 

 have a permanent transportation commit- 

 tee with a paid secretary. This committee 

 is kept busy in looking after matters in 

 this connection. 



THE COOPERATIVE AS80CUTION8 



Second, only, to the importance of grow- 

 in <» clean apples is the importance of 

 standing close by the cooperative organi- 

 zations ; the next five years means five 

 years of struggle to maintain our ground. 

 We have many advantages that none of our 

 competitors can ever have. The fittest only 

 will survive, and it is up to us to make 

 j/ood . 



In the death of .Alexander McNeill, for 

 many years Chief of the Federal Fruit 

 Division, this association and the great 

 fruit interests of Canada have lost a tried 

 and proven friend. Mr. McNeill was a 

 familiar figure in these meetings. He came 

 to us many times at much personal sacri- 

 fice. He was always ready to assist when 

 needed, to speak the cheering word and 

 work for the advancement of the fruit in- 

 terests of Canada. Personally, and, I am 

 sure I speak for every member, we deplore 

 the death of our late chief and feel the loss 

 of a friend and co-worker, who was always 

 ready to work for the advancement of a 

 true Canadian nationality. 



While the Fruit Division is without a 

 head, it seems an opportune time to press 

 on the Government the growing importance 

 of the fruit interests, and to urge the 

 Minister of Agriculture to establish horti- 

 culture as an independent department under 

 a commissioner, rather than remaining sub- 

 sidiary to some other department. 



A Wasted Fertilizer 



Jas. SackTille, Bewdley, Oit. 



Docs it not seem strange that more at- 

 tention has not been turned to the utiliza- 

 tion of the sewerage of the cities and towns 

 for manurial purposes? This material 

 should increase the productiveness of the 

 soil and return an increased supply of food 

 to the markets instead of polluting, as it 

 now does, the rivers and lakes with the filth 

 of towns and cities. 



There are many thousands of acres all 

 over this fair Dominion, lying almost waste, 

 which under proper cultivation and by the 

 use of the manure husbanded from the 

 sewerap'e and waste of towns and cities 

 might have their productiveness increased 

 in some cases tenfold their present yield. 

 We hear a good deal about government 

 ownership and municipal and governmental 

 control. Why could not city and town coun- 

 cils and municipalities secure the necessary 

 land and turn this filthy nuisance into a 

 profitable asset? 



