184 IHE CANADIAN IIORTICULTUIIIST. 



HOW CAN OUE FEUIT EXHIBITIONS BE IMPROVED ? 



BY A. HOOD, BARRIE, ONT. 



Having paid a visit to the Provincial Exhibition and inspected the 

 very fine show of fruit with which its tables were filled, it occurred to 

 me that improvents might be made in the plan of giving prizes and 

 arranging specimens for exhibition. What I object to under the 

 present system is that specimens of any of the principal kinds are to 

 be found in all parts of the hall, so that any one wishing to compare 

 those grown in different localities, to ascertain in what part of the 

 Province that particular kind flourishes best, will have a very tedious 

 time of it before he has found all the exhibits, and travelled back- 

 wards and forwards to make comparisons. This arises from the 

 number of sections in which any one variety may be shown, and the 

 manner in which fruits from all sections are mixed up together. For 

 instance, take any popular apple that may be good for cooking and 

 also for dessert, and I find on inspecting the prize list that it may be 

 shown in a number of sections, with three or four prizes in each, 

 making thirty different lots of the same apple, each of which takes a 

 prize, and each lot has five specimens, making in all one hundred end 

 fifty prize apples. And if there are, as there may be, two or three 

 times as many more which fail to take prizes, that would make from 

 three hundred to six hundred apples all of one kind, and these are to 

 be found in all parts of the hall according to the section in which they 

 appear. This is what may take place, and what does take place with 

 one leading variety only ; supposing then there are from 'ten to twenty 

 leading varieties, all multiplied in the same manner, and a still larger 

 number of varieties of secondary merit, each appearing in several 

 classes or sections, and some idea may be formed of the bewildering 

 character of our fruit exhibitions. 



Surely the system which causes this continual repetition of the 

 same varieties, frequently from the same localities, and often from 

 the same orchard, cannot be the best on which our fruits can be 

 exhibited, either as regards the benefits to be derived by those who 

 inspect them with a view of obtaining a knowledge of our fruit 

 products, or in consideration of the interests of exhibitors. If ten 

 specimens have to be examined where one would suffice, a loss of time 



