THE McINTOSH APPLE ON THE NEW YORK MARKET 



By Lorian P. Jefferson, 

 Assistant Research Professor of Agricultural Economics. 



The demand for New England apples in markets outside. New England is 

 a matter of increasing concern to New England growers. In 1926 there were 

 about 5,900,000 bearing trees with some 2,000,000 not yet in bearing in the 

 orchards of New England. In Massachusetts the non-hearing trees comprised 

 at that time 35 jier cent of the total number of trees in the commercial or- 

 chards of the state. Obvioush' this forecasts a considerable increase in the 

 production of apples in New England within a few years. A conservative 

 estimate of the normal increase in the number of bearing trees to be reached 

 by 1940 fixes this at some 600,000 more than there were in 1925; allowing for 

 unfavorable conditions in the apple industry, this figure can hardly be les.s 

 than 125,000 more trees than were in bearing in 1925.' 



The extension of better orchard practice is resulting in a larger proportion 

 of marketable apples. In view of the probable increase in the volume of 

 New England apples to be marketed, the growers of Massachusetts are 

 naturally interested in the possible outside markets for New England apples. 

 This study was made in order to determine the demand in New York, the 

 nearest and largest of these markets, particularly for tiie Mcintosh, the va- 

 riety which interests the growers of the state in general more than any other. 



The Outside Demand for New England Apples. 



The distribution of New England apples in certain markets outside New 

 England has been reported for a number of years by the United States 

 Department of Agriculture. In the season of 1925-26, these reports showed 

 that but sixteen of the markets included in the reports received apples from 

 New England, and that more than 75 per cent of the total volume (712 cars) 

 was shipped to New York City. None went fartiier west than Chicago or 

 farther south than Cincinnati. 



In the fall of 1927 the markets of Detroit, Mich., Hamilton and London, 

 Ont., Niagara Falls, Buffalo, Rochester and Syracuse, N. Y., were visited in 

 an effort to determine the distribution of New England apples. In Detroit 

 one dealer was found, the oldest in business in the city, who recalled that 

 some twenty-five years ago, two or three cars of New England apples were 

 shipped to Detroit in a season of shortage in the Middle Western crop. 



In the other United States markets the story was much the same. Either 

 nobody recalled ever seeing any New England apples in the market, or some- 

 times a few had been recci\'ed when the local crop was short. 



In the Canadian markets visited no record of receipts of New England 

 apples could be found. Transportation rates and the Canadian crop combine 

 to keep New England apples from these markets. 



The crop of 1926 was one of the largest ever grown in the United States, 

 and New England apples were distributed much less widely than in the pre- 

 vious year. This was obviously because prices were too low to warrant the 



> The Apple Situation in New England, published by the Connecticut and Maine Ex- 

 periment Stations, and the Extension Services of Massachusetts, New Hampshire and 

 Rhode Island. 1927. 



