PACKING AND MARKETING FRUITS 13 



business. By all means the best way of putting up 

 commercial apples is to pick them by hand from the 

 trees. 



There is something of a knack in picking apples, 

 but unfortunately expert apple pickers are not often 

 to be hired. The fruit-grower is usually obliged to 

 put up with ordinary day labor and to make up in 

 the carefulness of his own supervision the lack of 

 experience on the part of the pickers. Apple pick- 

 ers usually get the prevailing day wages, that is 

 from one dollar to one dollar and seventy-five cents 

 a day. Apples are sometimes picked by the bushel 

 or barrel, but this practice is not common and is not 

 to be recommended. When it is indulged in, the 

 price paid is from eight to fifteen cents a barrel. 

 The writer has recently been told, on pretty good 

 authority, of a picker who picked one hundred bar- 

 rels of apples from the trees in one day. Any such 

 slam-banging work as that ought to be prohibited in 

 any well regulated orchard. The ordinary picker 

 will pick from twelve to twenty barrels a day. 



Apples should be picked with the stems on and 

 not torn from the trees. Where the stem is pulled 

 out of the apple, the skin is usually broken and an 

 opportunity for decay given. 



Some pickers prefer to pick into a sack tied over 

 the shoulder. The best contrivance, however, is 

 undoubtedly the swinging-bail half-bushel basket. 

 This is made in various styles, usually of oak or elm 

 splints. These baskets are now used in such large 

 quantities that they can be bought at very reasonable 

 prices. If fine fruit Is to be handled with special 

 care, it is worth while to have the baskets padded 

 inside. Each basket should be furnished with a hook 

 made by bending a strong three-eighths inch wire 

 into the form of a very crooked S. This can be 

 hooked over the limb of the tree so as to leave the 



