148 THE CONNECTICUT POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



rests with the producer, who should seek to know what is 

 wanted most in the markets that he may exploit, and in what 

 manner it shoukl be presented to the consumer to command 

 the most profitable returns. 



I think it may be stated with fairness that twenty-five per 

 cent, of the present supplies of fruits and vegetables coming 

 to the markets of the country could be eliminated without loss 

 to anyone but the carriers. If the producer needs proof of this 

 let him consult his returns, which almost invariably disclose 

 little or nothing received for an important percentage of his 

 product, with time and labor actually lost in preparation, and 

 hauling to railway or steamboat. That the process is kept vip 

 year after year attests the sluggishness of the average agricul- 

 tural mind in properly sizing up the situation. As a rule, he 

 satisfies himself with wondering why, and blaming his com- 

 mission merchant. The fault rests with himself. With no 

 high standard to govern him, he grows his produce poorly, 

 preferring an acre badly cared for to a half acre well fertilized 

 and generously cultivated ; and if it be strawberries or rasp- 

 berries or currants, the result is an excess of undergrade stock, 

 all of which goes to market as it is, because it cannot stand 

 grading, and the returns, as stated, are disappointing and 

 unprofitable. Had one-half the acreage been put out, I ven- 

 ture the opinion that the same fertilizing and care as that 

 bestowed upon the larger patch would have brought returns 

 almost identical. It is not that the smaller, and logically, finer 

 product, would bring so much more money, but it would all be 

 sold, whereas a heavy percentage of the poorer stufif finds no 

 ultimate market, but is thrown away and lost. It has been 

 stated, with some degree of truth, that the great mass of con- 

 sumers (the common people) enjoy little advantage from an 

 over-production of fruits and vegetables. It is, I think, due 

 largely to the fact that, while at such periods of excess the 

 grower and huckster buy more liberally, the ultimate waste due, 

 as stated, to poor quality, demands an averaging up in prices 

 on the best to make him safe against loss. One of the largest 

 of our retail dealers in fruits and vegetables in New York, who 

 will put out as high as two hundred bushels of berries to his 

 Saturday trade, recently stated that it is never the quantity that 

 l)others him. If the fruit were graded better, and his percentage 



