412 BOARD OF AGEICULTURE. 



FRUIT AS A FARM PRODUCT. 



Bt E. W. Wood, of Newton. 



Within the memory and practical experience of some of 

 the members of this Board the routine work and general 

 management of the farms in this State required little thought 

 or business ability ; the main object of the farmers was to 

 supply as far as possible the family wants from the farm, 

 exchanging whatever surplus products they had for such 

 articles of domestic necessity as they could not or did not 

 produce. But with the immense population, creating a cor- 

 responding increase in the demand for farm products, with the 

 establishment of railroads and steamboat lines, furnishing 

 rapid and comparatively cheap means of transportation, ex- 

 tending over a wide area where quickly perishing prod- 

 ucts may be gathered and concentrated at the centres of 

 consumption, at the same time bringing the Western prairie 

 lands, enriched by centuries of decaying vegetation, in com- 

 petition with our New England hills, enabling the cultivators 

 of those distant fields to place some of the leading products 

 in our markets at prices that leave a narrow margin of profit 

 to the farmers of this State, — all these changes have ren- 

 dered necessary on the part of the farmers of the present 

 day a degree of care in the selection of crops and skill in 

 their management, requiring as much thought, care and 

 business ability as is required for the successful manage- 

 ment of any mercantile or manufacturing enterprise. 



Fruit has not, with few exceptions, been a principal or lead- 

 ing product with the farmers of this State. It has been gen- 

 erally an incidental, though not unfrequently an accidental 

 one. While the cultivation of the small fruits as conducive 

 to the health, comfort and enjoyment of the farmer's family, 

 as an attractive feature increasing the value of every farm, 



