5 acres), Small (i.e., 5.1 to 20 acres). Medium (i.e., 

 20.1 to 50 acres), and Large (i.e., over 50 acres). A 

 fifth category summarizing responses for all respon- 

 dents across all farm sizes was also included. Al- 

 though most questions allowed choices from a list 

 of possible options, some questions asked for a rank- 

 ing of importance (e.g., "1. On a scale of 1 to 5, rank 

 the topics listed below according to their importance 

 to your orchard management, with 1 meaning most 

 important, and 5 meaning least important."). In 

 order to summarize results, the appropriate num- 

 ber was entered (1-5) for each survey, and an aver- 

 age ranking was calculated for that topic or item. 

 Average score received by each choice then allowed 

 us to compare the relative importance of each topic 

 presented as possible answers to that question. For 

 example, an item with a final average score of 1.5 

 was deemed more important by respondents that 

 an item with a final score of 3.2 



and "horticulture" were ranked 1, 2, 3 respectively. 

 However, while "disease pest management" was 

 ranked number 1 by very small and small growers, 

 medium and large growers indicated that they 

 would prefer the team focus more on "horticulture" 

 than on the other choices. 



For Question 3, which asked respondents to sug- 

 gest which topics the team should de-emphasize in 

 order to focus more on other areas, all farm-size 

 categories were in agreement that we could de-em- 

 phasize "educating farmers in marketing" compared 

 wdth all other choices. Although initially surprising 

 to us, this result is consistent with responses to the 

 previous question which assigned a relatively low 

 importance to "educating farmers about marketing." 

 Apparently, Massachusetts fruit growers feel that 

 their marketing challenges are better left to their 

 own devices, and would prefer we emphasize the 

 production and protection of fruit crops. 



Responses to General Questions 



To illustrate the just-described process, consider 

 Question 1 (On a scale of 1-5, with 1 = Most Impor- 

 tant, and 5 = Least Important, please rank the top- 

 ics listed below in terms of their importance to your 

 orchard management). Ranking of summarized 

 responses for the category "All Growers" indicated 

 that fruit growers appeared to assign greatest im- 

 portance to the topic of "insect pest management", 

 followed by "disease pest management", "horticul- 

 ture", "other", "educating farmers in marketing", and 

 "educating consumers about agriculture". However, 

 within size categories, large growers assigned most 

 importance to the topic of "horticulture", small and 

 medium growers felt that 

 "insect pest management" 

 was most important, while 

 very small growers as- 

 signed their top ranking to 

 the topic of "disease pest 

 management". 



Similar differences in 

 perceived importance were 

 seen in Question 2, which 

 asked growers to choose 

 areas which they would 

 like the Tree Fruit Team to 

 focus on either more, less, 

 or the same relative to cur- 

 rent efforts. In the All 

 Growers category, "insect 

 pest management", "dis- 

 ease pest management" 



Demographic Information 



Within the 4,232 acres represented in the sur- 

 vey, very small farms, small farms, medium farms, 

 and large farms accounted for 122, 426, 918, and 

 2,766 acres, respectively (Table 1). 



Although different in many ways from farmers 

 in other parts of the country, the "primary farmer/ 

 grower" on Massachusetts fruit farms, like farmers 

 nationally, is in his/her early 50's (Table 1). By acre- 

 age, the oldest farmers (averaging 58 years old) were 

 in the very small size category. (For obvious rea- 

 sons, one entertaining response of "older than dirt" 

 could not be included in the summarized results.) 



The majority of production from all farms is sold 



Fruit Notes, Summer, 1996 



