HANDLING APPLES. 671 



B. B. OLDS, 



CLINTON, ROCK COUNTY. 



How to Handle Apples, and Where to Keep Them — Fruit 



House. 



HANDLING AND KEEPING APPLES. 



Doubtless many are ready to say that all has been said and 

 written upon this subject that need or can be said, forgetting 

 how few fruit growers bring into practice the teachings 

 of the best and most experienced fruit men, and how many 

 are making failures rather than success in this most important 

 branch of business. 



While I hardly hope to bring out new ideas upon the sub- 

 ject, I shall feel amply paid for my effort if I succeed in 

 awakening an interest that may result in any decided change 

 among farmers in the way of handling apples. 



SHOULD BRING BETTER PRICES. 



From observations made in marketing my last year's 

 crop as in years before, I am convinced that with proper care 

 the early and Fall apples may as well bring eighty as forty 

 cents per bushel. The most common way practiced by the 

 farmers whose methods have come under my observation, is, as 

 soon as it is seen that the apples are falling freely, and are ripe 

 and mellow, to shake them from the tree and hurriedly dump 

 them into bags, with stems and leaves clinging to them, includ- 

 ing perhaps the small and inferior wormy ones all right in 

 together. They then take them off in a lumber wagon to 

 market, pretty well satisfied with a net sale of forty cents. 

 The dealer says, " That is all we can pay for Wisconsin apples," 

 while at the same time good Michigan apples, well put up, are 

 selling for two and a half to three dollars per barrel. Under 

 these circumstances the dealer can't afford to pay any more, 



