56 FRUIT-GROWER, ST. JOSEPH, MO. 



cents. In the south the pay is sometimes as low as 

 y 2 to 4 cents a Quart. 



Various methods have been tried of keeping 

 account of the pickers' work, but the one now almost 

 universally adopted is the punch-card system. Each 

 picker is provided with a punch-card. When 

 a picker has a certain number of baskets filled 

 with fruit he delivers them to the foreman, and 

 the foreman punches the picker's card with the num- 

 ber picked. The picker keeps these cards till the day, 

 of settlement, in most cases, and the grower pays 

 what these punched cards call for. The great ad- 

 vantage of this system is that it leaves the picker in 

 sole charge of the evidence of his work, and thus 

 prevents any quarrels over the amount of fruit 

 picked. 



A similar plan requires two of these cards, and 

 both are punched at one operation. Thus the picker 

 and the foreman each has a record. 



Strawberries are almost always picked into the 

 quart baskets in which they are sold. In fields 

 where the fruit is sorted before being sent to market 

 this is still the practice, the quart baskets being the 

 most convenient receptacle for picking and measur- 

 ing the crop. When berries are sorted they are sim- 

 ply poured out of the boxes and sorted back into 

 them again. 



It is customary and advisable to provide each 

 picker with a small tray holding six baskets of fruit. 

 This tray has a light bail and four short legs. Such 

 trays can be made for about 5 to 7 cents each, or can 

 be bought ready-made of dealers in fruit packages. 



We have referred above to the sorting of the 

 fruit. Many growers practice this as a regular thing. 

 Probably a greater number do not. The question of 

 whether it will pay to sort or not must be settled by 



