APPLES 



83 



Ing accepted among fruit growers. This 

 decade, too. was one in which fruit grow- 

 ing was greatly extended as the following 



figures taken from the Eleventh and 

 Twelfth United States Census Reports will 

 show. 



Xnniber of Apple and Peach Trees of Bearing Age in United States 



* Since this article was written returns from the Thirteenth Census have been published 

 showing a falling off in the number of trees of bearing age during the decade from 1000 to 1910 

 registering a loss' in apples of 33.4 per cent and of peaches of 5.7 per cent from the figures of 1900. 



*• The number of bearing apple trees reported in 1910 is 151.323.000 and of peaches 

 94,507,000. When the 20-year period is taken into consideration there was an increase in 1910 

 of 7S.9 per cent in apples oVer ISOO and an increase of 57 per cent in peaches for the same period. 



It will thus be seen that during the 

 decade from 1890 to 1900 there was an 

 increase of 68 per cent in the number of 

 bearing apple trees and 85.4 per cent in 

 the number of bearing peach trees in the 

 country. 



It is hardly possible to refer to such a 

 large increase in the producing capacity 

 of orchard trees without at the same time 

 suggesting that perennial question: "Is 

 there danger of over-production?" 



There is no denying on theoretical 

 grounds that such a danger does exist, but 

 the probability is very remote. 



This fear of over-production is not mod- 

 ern though it Is very up-to-date in the 

 matter of its recurrence. It was said a 

 half century ago that in 10 years' time 

 apples would not be worth picking and 

 there is said to be a record of a man in 

 Western New York who cut down his 

 orchard because of his fears in this re- 

 spect. Todaj-, so far as any actual experi- 

 ence goes, we are apparently no nearer 

 the point of over-production in apples 

 than was the case 25 and 50 years ago. 



I have recently had before me the an- 

 nual commercial estimates of apple pro- 

 duction for a consecutive period of 17 

 years. The annual average of the esti- 

 mates for this period is 41,134.000 barrels. 

 The average for the past 10 years, includ- 

 ing the crop of 1910, is 32,572,000 barrels 

 and for the past five years the average Is 

 only 27,966,000 barrels. 



It is evident that for one cause or an- 

 other the production has been falling off 

 on the basis of the several periods men- 



tioned, even in spite of the great extension 

 in the planting of apple orchards. 



No doubt this drop in production la 

 largely accounted for by the fact that for 

 quite a long period of years conditions have 

 been unfavorable for the production of 

 fruit in large and import fruit growing 

 regions. And when we think of it. Is It 

 not a fact that the year is a very excep- 

 tional one in which all fruit regions pro- 

 duce a full or normal crop of fruit? 



Such a year so far as apple production 

 was concerned apparently prevailed In 

 1896, when the largest estimated apple 

 crop in the history of the country was 

 produced, amounting to more than 69,- 

 000,000 barrels, according to the commer- 

 cial estimates. 



Another very interesting feature follows 

 in natural sequence. The development of 

 mechanical cold storage of fruits has been 

 almost contemporaneous with the develop- 

 ment of spraying and the great expansion 

 of orchard planting. In fact, cold stor- 

 age would amount to but little so far as 

 apples are concerned if it were not for 

 spraying, because there would be but 

 very few apples worth storing if it were 

 not for the use of insecticides and fun- 

 gicides. 



It was about the year 1890 that the 

 first mechanical cold storage plant was 

 used for storing apples. The development 

 was rapid, once its importance was real- 

 ized, but by 1896, the year of the big 

 crop, the capacity of all such plants com- 

 bined was relatively insignificant com- 

 pared with the capacity at the present 



