216 Cooperation in Agriculture 



cayed fruit is demoralizing to the fruit industry. The 

 losses from decay formerly cost the citrus growers of Cali- 

 fornia from three-quarters of a million to a million and a 

 half dollars annually, most of which was preventable. In 

 1911 the claims for decay and all other kinds of damage 

 by the railroads was less than one per cent of the F.O.B. 

 value on cars handled by one organization through which 

 was distributed more than sixty per cent of the entire 

 citrus crop. 



The Remedy for Decay in Citrus Fruits 



The causes of decay in the citrus fruits of California 

 were determined through the work of the United States 

 Department of Agriculture. The department showed 1 

 that the underlying cause of decay was carelessness in 

 picking and handling the fruit and that the system of 

 fruit handling as practiced in California and in other 

 states put a premium on careless work. It was suggested 

 by the department that the picking of the fruit be done 

 by the associations rather than by the individual members 

 in order that the physical handling might be standardized. 

 Gangs of labor were then organized by the associations, 

 and each gang was placed in charge of a capable foreman. 

 The pickers were paid by the day rather than by the box, 

 and the fruit of fifty members was thereby handled with 

 the same degree of care that the careful individual grower 

 bestowed on the harvesting of his crop. Commercially 

 speaking, the decay in citrus fruit handled in this manner 

 was practically eliminated, an enormous saving was ef- 



1 The Decay in Oranges while in Transit from California, Bulletin 123, 

 Bureau of Plant Industry, G. Harold Powell and associates. 



