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For juicy summer fruit the value of cold storage is not so much 

 for keeping them for any length of time as for tiding them over a 

 glutted market. Such fruit, as strawberries and raspberries, should 

 not be kept over a day or two. Grapes do not retain their flavour, 

 bloom, or appearance if kept longer than a week or two. Of pears, 

 some will keep well ; others, such as the Bartlett, may be put in 

 early in the autumn, and stowed away in such a manner as will 

 allow the cold air to circulate freely around them, and should be 

 sold as soon as the market is relieved. There is then a good 

 demand for them. Late peaches, firm and sweet, may be stored 

 with profit. Apples, of all fruit, keep best, and moreover, improve 

 by keeping in cold storage, but with whatever fruit is stored, 

 success will depend on the kind, condition when gathered, care in 

 handling, packing, method of storing, as well as the temperature 

 at which it is kept. 



Two other conditions influence the keeping quality of fruit to a 

 larger extent than most people imagine. One is the quality and 

 amount of fertilising nutriment the tree draws from the earth 

 during the period of its growth, and the other its freedom from 

 attacks of parasites, the sort of blight affecting it, and its state of 

 health generally. 



How TO COOL AND THAW FRTJIT. 



Fruit for export in cool chambers must not be placed hot and 

 fresh from the fields into the cool chamber. Thorough " sweating " 

 must precede, then sorting, wrapping in oiled paper, and placed in 

 non- ventilated, insulated chambers, the temperature of which is 

 slowly lowered to 35 to 40 F. This temperature must be 

 uniformly maintained during the whole period of storage. Neglect 

 of this condition caused, in the initial days of fruit transportation 

 to distant markets, considerable damage and loss. 



On arrival at its destination, it is essential to the good keeping 

 of that fruit that almost as much thought and time be given to its 

 return to a normal temperature as was done when cooling it. This 

 warming up should be slow, gradual, and carried out in a dry 

 atmosphere. To lack of proper attention to these details is 

 chargeable a good many of the failures in fruit shipment. 



SHIPMENT CHARGES. 



Hitherto shipping fruit from the Australian States to the 

 London market has not proved a uniformly remunerative enter- 

 prise. Apart from the heavy packing, shipping, and handling 

 charges which are known beforehand, heavy losses have been sus- 

 tained through circumstances which may be only guessed, but 

 which nevertheless remain without reasonable explanation. 



Out of a shipment of 50 cases of carefully selected, graded, 

 and packed fruit, for instance, 40 or so would sell at a remunerative 

 price, whilst the remaining 10 would on opening show signs of 

 decav, and would be sold at considerable loss. It is fortunate, 



