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WESTERN METHODS IN NEW ENGLAND ORCHARDING.' 



F. C. SEARS, PROFESSOR OF POMOLOGY, MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURAL 



COLLEGE, 



Even the most casual observer, if he gives the subject any 

 consideration whatever, must be impressed with the fact that 

 eastern fruit has been almost entirely crowded out of the 

 better class of our eastern markets. It still commands a part 

 of the second and third and fourth class markets, where 

 worm-holes and bruises and apple scab are not considered 

 insurmountable objections to an apple ; but who ever sees 

 a sign displayed these days in any high-class fruit store, 

 " Choice Massachusetts Apples " (or Connecticut or Ver- 

 mont or Tvlaine apples) ? There are honorable exceptions, of 

 course, to this exclusion of our eastern fruit, men who care 

 for their orchards and who pack their fruit carefully and 

 skilfully, and whose fruit commands the highest market 

 price. But these men have personally overcome the preju- 

 dice which exists in the minds of most consumers against 

 our eastern apples. The vast majority of New England 

 orchardists. however, send their fruit to the general market 

 and take what is left after the several " middlemen " have 

 received their share, and little enough it is, as a rule. 



All this is discouraging to any one who is interested in 

 eastern orcharding, and who would like. to see the industry 

 take its place where it belongs, as one of the leading branches 

 of farming in N"ew England, and as the equal, if not the 

 superior, of orcharding anywhere in the country. 



The situation would be far more discouraging were it not 

 for the few cases alluded to above, where men are already 

 making the orchard business a splendid success here in ISTew 

 England ; and were there not certain factors which warrant 



1 Agriculture of Massachusetts, 1909. 



