No. 4.] FEUIT GROWING. 163 



twenty years there has been a constantly increasing demand 

 for export to foreign countries, which has taken the surplus 

 fruit, often at better prices than were realized in the home 

 market. The amount of fruit exported varies Avidely in 

 different years, not because there is not a foreign demand, 

 but in unfruitful years the crop is insufficient to supply the 

 home trade. From 1870 to 1875, the first five years when 

 this trade became generally known, there were shipped from 

 this country to foreign ports 451,379 barrels of apples, re- 

 turning in value $1,510,984 ; during the last five years, from 

 1888 to 1893, there were shipped 2,959,432 barrels, return- 

 ing in value $8,744,465, and this trade is still in its infancy 

 and susceptible of almost indefinite extension. 



In connection with the export trade in green fruit there 

 has been a constantly increasing demand for apples for evap- 

 oration. It is reported in Bradstreet's report that within 

 the ai'ea of a circle forty miles in diameter around the city 

 of Rochester, in New York State, there have been in a single 

 year more than six million bushels of apples evaporated. 

 The importance of this industry has hardly yet been recog- 

 nized in Massachusetts. There were exported, during the 

 five years from 1870 to 1875, 13,348,746 pounds of evapo- 

 rated fruit, returning a value of $716,894; for the five 

 years from 1888 to 1893 the amount was 87,782,433 pounds, 

 returning $4,750,141. 



Of the evaporated fruit shipped during the last five years, 

 62,300,000 pounds were shipped from New York and only 

 607,000 pounds from Boston. Among the advantages of 

 exporting evaporated fruit is the reduced cost for freight, 

 beino; about one-sixth the cost of the same value of arreen 

 fruit, and the ability to hold it when it arrives at its destined 

 port to take advantage of the market. This disposition of 

 the fruit enables the grower to utilize what otherwise would 

 prove a waste product, as the windfalls and bruised fruit, 

 with comparatively little labor, may be made to yield from 

 sixty to seventy-five cents per bushel, which, if carried to 

 the cider mill, would average little if any more than ten 

 cents per bushel. 



In setting an orchard to grow apples for the wholesale 

 market the selection of varieties is a matter of the first im- 



