THE CANADIAN HORTICULTURIST 



fruit should be held by the owners until 

 ready for use if the best ultimate results 

 are to be reached. If green stuff is put 

 on the market, such as Ben Davis ap- 

 ples are in December, it makes an un- 

 favorable impression. The grower or 

 packer should b? the best judge of the 

 fitness of the fruit for the market. If 

 the grower or packer does not hold the 

 fruit until ready for use, he has no rea- 

 son to 'expect that anyone else between 

 him and the consumer will be interested 

 enough to do so. As a result of immedi- 

 ate shipping much unripe fruit is being 

 sold to consumers in Europe and in the 

 west, and an unfavorable impression is 

 being created. To store fruit for the 

 winter, the associations may rent space 

 in large city storage houses, or they may 

 construct storages of their own. 



The Georgian Bay fruit growers have 

 constructed a building — a combined 

 packing house and storage house of good 

 pattern. This building is 100 feet in 

 length and 40 feet in width, and con- 

 sists of a basement nine feet high and a 

 storage and packing house 13 feet 

 high. The basement, as well as the 

 storage house above, is intended for 

 winter storage. The ground floor above 

 the basement is divided into two parts 

 — -one part, about 25 x 40, consisting of 

 the packing house proper, the other 

 part, 75 x 40, consisting of the storage 

 house. The walls are concrete, 10 

 inches thick, and from the ground 

 floor to the first floor the wall is insulated 

 with one inch lumber, tongued and 

 grooved, inside the concrete, with four 

 inch space between the lumber and con- 

 crete — this space being filled with planer 

 shavings. 



The building is well provided with 

 windows, and, in addition, for ventila- 

 tion two large flues, one near each end 

 of the building, have been provided, 

 running from the basement ceiling to 

 the garret and extending some six feet 

 above the garret floor. As these flues 

 pass through the storage chamber be- 

 tween the ground floor and the first 

 floor, slides are provided that may be 

 opened or shut as desired for change of 

 air in the storage chamber. When the 

 windows in the basement are opened a 

 strong current of air passes up these 

 flues and effects a rapid change of air 

 and affords a means of controlling the 

 temperature of the chamber. It is 

 hoped that by means of the thorough 

 ventilation and the well-insulated walls 

 the temperature can be kept at about 

 freezing point throughout the winter. 

 The company are storing all their winter 

 fruit and expect to hold it until they 

 judge it fit for use. In order to enable 

 all the members of the company to hold 

 their fruit, arrangements have been 

 made with the bank to advance pay- 

 ment on the fruit stored, at the rate of 

 one dollar per barrel. The bank loans 

 the money to the company on security 

 of their warehouse receipts. 



In September, packing houses in west- 

 ern .Michigan and in northern Ohio were 

 visited. In western Michigan I found 

 nothing at all in advance of what is 

 being done at different places in Ontario. 

 vSome of the associations, as at Fenn- 

 ville, Benton Harbor and Bangor, have 

 built their own packing houses, while 

 others, for the time being, are renting 

 space. The organization of these com- 

 panies is generally co-operative, and all 

 on much the same plan as the co-opera- 

 tive associations in Ontario. Bv far the 



crop. For peaches and pears they use 

 almost entirely machine graders of the 

 type known as the Rope Sizer. I was 

 much impressed with the efficiency of 

 these machines, and am convinced that 

 they could be used to advantage in any 

 of our co-operative packing houses for 

 grading apples and pears particularly. 

 These graders are operated by foot power, 

 the operator sitting at the upper end of 

 the machine and at the same time feed- 

 ing the fruit from the hopper into the 

 grooves of the machine. At the dif- 



Receiving Fruit at the Warehouse of The Chatham Fruit Growers' Association 



best equipped and best managed 

 packing house that I visited in the 

 States is that at Gypsum, Ohio, man- 

 aged by Mr. W. H. Owen. The pack- 

 ing house there was built for the 

 purpose, and has one or two features 

 worthy of note. It is alongside of the 

 railway track, so that fruit can be load- 

 ed directly from the packing house 

 on to the car. The depth of the build- 

 ing, from the track back, is 52 feet, not 

 including the shed. The width, par- 

 allel to the track, is 1 50 feet. The depth, 

 52 feet, is said by the manager to be 

 about right to allow room for the un- 

 graded fruit at one side, for grading in 

 the middle, and for shipping at the op- 

 posite side next the track. This width 

 is divided into 24 feet for the delivery 

 floor and 28 feet for the grading and 

 shipping floor. The latter floor is three 

 and a half feet lower than the delivery 

 floor, and at the breast of the upper floor 

 the grading tables and machine graders 

 are placed. The width, 150 feet, is pro- 

 portional to the amount of business done. 

 For a smaller business this width should 

 be less, but the depth, 52 feet, allows 

 just enough space for turning over the 

 fruit from the grower to the car. Above 

 this floor there is a second floor for 

 empty packages. 



I might add a word or two with re- 

 gard to the handling of the fruit at Gyp- 

 sum. Most of the fruit consists of 

 tender varieties, such as peaches, pears, 

 and plums — peaches being the principal 



ferent grades attendants stand remov- 

 ing undesirable specimens of fruit, such 

 as bruised, imperfectly formed, and over- 

 ripe fruit. The machine grades very 

 accurately according to size. 



In most of the packing houses on the 

 other side I was surprised to find that 

 bushel baskets were used for shipping 

 peaches. These peaches were princi- 

 pally of the Elberta variety, and, there- 

 fore, were fairly well adapted to the 

 large basket. Where customers asked 

 it or with softer varieties the 12-quart 

 or smaller baskets were used. 

 - Mr. Owen drew my attention to the 

 fact that they made no attempt to 

 "face" their baskets of fruit. The 

 peaches or other fruits were left at the 

 top of the basket exactly as they hap- 

 pened to fall without the slightest at- 

 tempt at selection, even in the matter 

 of color. Mr. Owen claims that only by 

 doing this can they secure the confidence 

 of their customers, for by making no 

 attempt at facing the surface of the 

 fruit represents in every particular the 

 contents of the package. Any purchaser 

 securing one of these packages of fruit 

 suffers no disappointment as he pene- 

 trates farther and farther into the pack- 

 age. I notice that in packing apples in 

 barrels in various packing houses in 

 Ontario the custom is to face the head 

 of the barrel very carefully by selecting, 

 not the largest fruit, but fruit of uniform 

 size and good color. Mr. Owen would 

 not do this, and claims that by refrain- 



