BULLETIN 231] WALNUT CULTURE IN CALIFORNIA. 195 



object of drying them as rapidly as possible without. too great exposure 

 either to the sun or to moisture. In the former case they are likely to 

 split open, especially in poorly sealed varieties. In the latter they 

 may become moldy and discolored. The larger and more progressive 

 walnut growers, both north and south, are coming more and more to 

 the use of artificial heat and enclosed buildings for drying their wal- 

 nuts, rather than depending upon the uncertainties of the weather. In 

 this way the nuts can be dried uniformly and quickly with no danger 

 of exposure either to rain or hot sunshine. In the northern part of 

 the State where early rains are more likely to occur and where later 

 varieties of walnuts are more commonly grown, such artificial dryers 

 are an absolute necessity in handling walnuts on a large scale and even 

 in southern California they are coming into use. We will not take 

 space to describe the details of such a dryer here but may say that 

 a very large and complete one has recently been installed by Mr. J. F. 

 Burgess of the Vrooman Kanch, Santa Rosa, which is well worth visit- 

 ing to one contemplating such an apparatus. 



After drying it is necessary that the nuts be graded to some extent 

 at home in order to remove the culls and worthless nuts before delivery 

 at the packing-house. For this purpose the nuts may be spread out 

 again on trays or handled from sack to sack if working on a small 

 scale, while on a larger scale an arrangement consisting of an inclined 

 bin or runway large enough to hold several sacks or even several tons of 

 nuts is desirable. In such a contrivance the nuts pass out at the lower 

 end under the control of the operator, who picks out the culls and allows 

 the good nuts to run into sacks, in which they are carried to the 

 packing-house. Mr. C. B. Franklin of Carpinteria has an excellent 

 arrangement of this sort. 



PACKING-HOUSE OPERATIONS. 

 SAMPLING. 



According to the methods commonly in practice in southern Cali- 

 fornia the walnuts on delivery by the grower at the packing-house 

 are first sampled for quality. The inspector picks out one hundred nuts 

 here and there at random from the sacks and cracks each one to 

 examine the meat as to fullness and color. There are various require- 

 ments as to quality, but usually nuts which crack from 80 to 90 per 

 cent of sound, fairly-light-colored meats will pass. The standard varies 

 considerably from year to year, according to the general quality and 

 quantity of the crop and the condition of the market. Not over 10 per 

 cent of badly shriveled or entirely bad meats is often accepted, while 

 in color it is usually expected that 45 or 50 per cent must be white or 



