84 STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



had this season, to which your apples were a very valuable con- 

 tribution." 



Mr. W. H. Keith of Winthrop, an extensive orchardist, and also 

 large!}- engaged in packing and evaporating frnit, was invited to 

 open the discussion on any subject suggested by his own experience. 

 He said, 



Mr. President: I did not come in with the expectation of being 

 called upon to say anything, but rather to listen to those who have 

 had more experience than I. However, I will just say that this year 

 T have been using new barrels, and that I like them for the reason 

 that it did not take more than half as long to pack the apples as it 

 did to get those barrels read}' that we used to pick up. T think 

 that it would be a wise plan for all of us to adopt the practice of 

 getting new barrels to pack our apples in. 



Question. Please tell us what barrels you use and what they cost. 



Mr. Keith. My barrels were made in Vienna, Maine. They 

 are supposed to be of the same size as flour barrels, but I have 

 never compared them. The staves were made of spruce, but they 

 can also be made of fir or poplar, to good advantage ; and the hoops 

 generally had the bark left on them. They make a veiy neat, in- 

 viting-looking barrel. I believe if we would make a little effort, it 

 would enhance the value of our product of apples in making sales. 

 I don't know what the price of flour barrels has been this 3'ear, 

 we used to buy them- and I think we had to pay twenty-five cents 

 for them — the same price that I paid for the others at the factor}'. 



Mr. Briggs. We pa}' twenty cents in Androscoggin County. 



Mr. Sawyer. In our locality we pay fifteen cents. 



Mr. Keith. Some of our people have bought barrels in Augusta 

 for fifteen cents. 



Mr. Sweetser. We have to pay twenty cents in Portland. 



Mr. Keith. I think the only obstacle to establishing a barrel 

 factory would be this : there are a great many wlio would not pay 

 twenty-five cents for a new barrel, if they could get an old one for 

 fifteen cents. 



In regard to evaporating apples, I have been in the business for 

 the last five or six years. I use the American evaporator. It takes 

 a crew of five or six men to run the evaporator properly, and it 

 costs seventy-five cents per day to heat it. This year I have evap- 

 orated about nine hundred barrels of apples. I had quite a large 

 quantity of New York Russets, and also of Winthrop Greenings, 



