STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 71 



Ques. In picking apples would you recommend, instead of hav- 

 ing your picker drop his small apples on the ground and put the 

 others into a basket and empty them into a barrel, that he should 

 have a sorting box in the tree, and let five or six men pick apples 

 into baskets as they would happen to, and then one man take his 

 sorting box and sort them all out? 



Ans. That would depend somewhat on how the man was situa- 

 ted. I am situated near a large market, and after some experience 

 have concluded that the better way for me is to have the men drop 

 the unmerchantable fruit upon the ground. And each man in 

 emptying his basket is instructed to remove the stems and leaves. 

 It is well to have a little piece of old carpeting in the basket for 

 apples are very sensitive to injury, and if you want the best results 

 you must take the best care of them. 



Ques. What varieties do you depend upon ? 



Ans. The Baldwin is the great apple for the million. You can 

 sell more Baldwins than you can any other variety of winter 

 apples, and so far as I know the Baldwin to-day is the leading 

 apple in Massachusetts. I think as time goes on there will be 

 apples that will supercede the Baldwin, but those things take time. 

 I have some apples that bring me a dollar a barrel more than the 

 Baldwin, but in no great quantity. I do not suppose there has 

 been a Baldwin put in my house for a quarter of a century ; the 

 reason is we have better apples. And people will soon learn to 

 discriminate between the quality of apples. The Yellow Bellflower 

 is perhaps not as profitable an apple to grow for the market as the 

 Baldwin, but for family use at this time of the year there is scarce- 

 ly any better apple. In many sections during the month of Janu- 

 ary it is one of the best apples to cook that I know of. The Bald- 

 win lacks quality, — is no; really a first class apple, but you can 

 sell more of them than of any other kind. 



Qaes. To what extent is the packing of fancy fruit in crates 

 being carried on in Massachusetts ? 



Aiis. To no very large exient ; that will do very well on a small 

 scale, but if you have 1500 or 2000 barrels of apples and attempt 

 to put them into crates you will have a job. The barrel is stored 

 more easily in the cellar, also. Still I know of one verj' excellent 

 fruit grower in Weare who puts his apples into crates. He has an 

 apple called the Granite Beauty, which is a first class apple and 

 brings a good price. If a person has plenty of time to attend to 

 this, perhaps it is all right ; but with a large quantity of apples 

 you cannot bother with crates. 



