50 THE CONNECTICUT POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



who are engaged in the picking. And that suggests a 

 thing which may be interesting to you — no colored labor is 

 employed in the orchards in our section. It may perhaps be 

 interesting for you to know that we have no negroes in the 

 section of the state from which I come. That is, none to 

 speak of. They have never been there. That section of the 

 state, therefore, has not been troubled with the perplexing 

 labor problems which have arisen in sections where the col- 

 ored help has been abundant. The labor in pur section is 

 almost entirely, in fact I may say, entirely white. 



A good man will pick about 45 to 50 bushels a day, and 

 with five men at the packing tables and ten to pick we are 

 able to grade, sort and barrel from 80 to 100 barrels a day. 

 So that we estimate it will cost us from sixty cents to seventy- 

 five a barrel to pick and sort and lay fruit down at the rail- 

 road station ready for shipping. Of course, it depends, to 

 some extent, upon the distance from the railroad that the 

 orchard is situated and what it will cost to haul the fruit to 

 market. 



The last year apples sold with us for less money than I 

 have ever known them to sell before, and yet a careful study 

 of the statistics, kept by our local horticultural society, of- 

 some 60 to 100 places, shows a net profit of about one hun- 

 dred dollars per acre, even though the fruit sold for less money 

 than ever before. I do not know whether we wull have a 

 repetition of that or not, but we have been fortunate in this 

 respect, that our crop }ears have been good wdien your people 

 in the North have had a short crop. I do not know of any 

 particular reason for that, but that is something that we very 

 frequently hear spoken of. Our scientific friends say that 

 that condition will continue. I have no information on that 

 point, so I am not able to dispute any of their statements, but 

 I don't know why they think so. 



Plums are being planted quite largely with us, and have 

 done fairly well, but the market for that fruit, which has 

 existed heretofore, seems to be rather overdone. There does 

 not seem to be the same encouragement for the grower in the 

 plum line that there does in some others. 



