An Apple Enterprise Study— Costs and Management"^ 



By H. C. WooDWORTH and G. F. Potter 



Apple production has been an important enterprise in sonthern 

 New Ilampsliire t'oi' many decades. Tlie aunnal total farm production 

 for tlie 20-year period endinji' in 1908 was on the average 2,793,000 

 Ijushels and for the next 20-year period the average production was 

 J, 268,000 bushels or less than half the total production of the earlier 

 period. According to the Federal Census the number of bearing apple 

 trees had been reduced from 2,034,398 in 1900 to 620,-112 in 1925. 



Prior to 1900, however, there were few specialized fruit farms, and 

 the large number of apple trees and the large state production were 

 the sum of many small farm orchards scattered along the stone walls, 

 or clustered near the farm houses. In a state survey of commercial 

 orchards in 1925^ only seventeen farms were found with 500 or more 

 trees set out prior to 1895, and only 122 farms with more than 200 

 trees set prior to that date. 



Due to two types of difficulties many of the small farm orchards of 

 Ihis early periocl have failed to survive. New insects, pests and dis- 

 eases, including the gypsy and browntail moths, made spraying neces- 

 sary for the production of marketable fruit or even to save the life of 

 the tree itself. In addition, the competition of good quality apples 

 from better organized, fruit regions made it increasingly difficult for 

 the small local grower to find a satisfactory market. In some com- 

 munities the farmers lost intei*est in fruit and abandoned the trees to 

 the pests. In other sections growers met the situation with improved 

 care of the trees, found it profitable and commenced gradually to ex- 

 pand their plantings into specialized apple farms. Since estimates of 

 the connnercial apple crop have been available these have shown a 

 steady increase in New Hampshire. Good profits from the Mcintosh 

 variety iuive contributed to this expansion. Fruit farming on a large 

 scale is thus a comparatively new industry ; at least it is when measured 



* The writers are indebted to the Bureau of Agricultural Economics for 

 forms used on the route study, and especially to J. W. Tapp and J. B. Hut- 

 son for assistance in initiating the study. 



Acknowledgment is made to the following farm operators and men for 

 their patience in keeping records over a long period: 

 H. G. Brierly A. C. Colburn Allan Orde 



Prescott Torrey Harold Hardy G. D. Kittredge 



George Plumber George R. Walsh Harry Chase 



Wallace P. Mack Ralph B. Bascom E. G. Young 



W. P. Mack, Jr. Frank Hardy A. F. Rockwood 



Alden S. Morrill Leon Wiltshire Alfred French 



Albert E. Searles C. H. Glover John Shugrue 



Irving Messer 



1 G, F. Potter and H. A. Rollins, Commercial Apple Industry of New 

 Hampshire. N. H. Bulletin 223, 1920. 



