170 THE CANADIAN IIORTICULTUIilST. 



shillings, and 3^011 have ten hundred and eighty shillings for the sixty 

 barrels. But you have saved the purchase of forty packing barrels at 

 not less than one shilling sterling per barrel. Or if you have purchased 

 them you can sell them at home for the shilling sterling apiece. 'Now 

 add this forty shillings which you get for your unused barrels to the 

 ten hundred and eighty shillings, and you have eleven hundred and 

 twenty shillings for }^our sixty barrels, whereas you only realized 

 eleven hundred shillings for your hundred barrels. But the forty 

 barrels that you have left are not Mdiolly without value. The drying 

 machines will allow j^ou fifteen cents per bushel for them at the very 

 least, which is fii'tecn dollars, or sixty shillings more — enough to pay 

 for all the extra labor of selection and care of packing. 



But much can be done by proper attention to the orchard to lessen 

 the number of defective specimens. By judicious pruning, by thinning 

 the fruit, by destroying the insects, the number of defective specimens 

 and wormy apples can be very materially reduced. The time is upon 

 ns when the man who gives his time and study to the production of 

 first class fruit, and ships only such to marivet, will reap a rich reward 

 for all his care and painstaking. 



There is another matter that the Si. Catharines Journal mentions 

 that is well worthy of attention on the part of fruit growers. It is 

 this : The growers fail to realize the value of their fruit because it is 

 made to pass through so rhany hands before it reaches the consumer, 

 each one of whom must have his profits. The grower usually sells to 

 the apple buyer M'ho goes around buying up the surplus fruit. He 

 ships it to Montreal, where it is bought by the European shipper, who 

 consigns it to a shipper in Liverpool, London or Glasgow. The Journal 

 suggests that the fruit growers combine and send a trusty agent to 

 England or elsewhere, and make arrangements for direct shipments 

 from the producer to the wholesale dealer in the foreign market, and 

 thus save a large part of the profits of these middlemen. The apple 

 growers in each township could easily combine for this purpose, and 

 by a little efibrt this combination could be extended over the county. 

 By a contribution from each in proportion to the quantity each shipped, 

 a fund could be raised to defray all the expenses incident to the 

 business. While thus united for a common purpose, each grower 

 would have his own brand wliereby his fruit Vv'ould be knowni, and 

 each receive what, his own fruit broua-ht. AVe believe that the fruit 



