Packages 151 



The refrigerator is a distinct advantage to the grower 

 who has not enough berries to load a refrigerator car. It 

 is used early in the season, when pickings are small and 

 prices high ; when the season is at its height, refrigerator 

 cars are used and the berries are packed in American ven- 

 tilated crates. The refrigerator is shipped by express; 

 it costs six to nine cents a quart to put Florida berries 

 into northern markets. Refrigerators cost four to five 

 dollars each. Most Florida growers now own their 

 own refrigerators, but at one time certain commission 

 men derived a handsome profit from renting them to 

 growers. 



California chests. 



A stout case holding forty-five pint boxes, with a tray on 

 top holding twenty-five pounds of ice, is used in California. 

 The insulation of these cases is rather poor, but they can 

 travel for twenty-four hours without re-icing. Each 

 grower has his own ice chests and they are returned to him 

 when empty. Ice chests are used when only a few crates 

 are shipped to one place. 



Many California berries are shipped in un-iced return 

 chests. The chest used in the Watsonville district costs 

 about three dollars and holds eighty, pounds of berries. A 

 chest has twenty slides, or drawers, each of which holds two 

 boxes of berries of two pounds each (Plate XIV). The 

 chest and slides are returned to the grower, the boxes are 

 not. The slides are 15| X 8f X if inches. Smaller chests 

 with ten or fifteen slides are used to some extent. Some- 

 times berries are shipped loose in the drawers of these 

 chests; this is, essentially, the old Cincinnati stand, 

 which was used by Mississippi Valley growers from 1845 

 to 1890. 



