EVAPORATION OF FRUITS. 57 



STORING THE DRIED PRODUCTS. 



In many plants the storage room is a part of the evaporator build- 

 ing adjacent to the conditioning room, or even continuous with it. 

 This arrangement is permissible if it is the practice in the plant to 

 pack and dispose of the fruit as rapidly as it is made. It is exceed- 

 ingly bad practice if the run of the entire season is to be completed 

 before packing and shipping begins or if the fruit is to be held for a 

 favorable market after the close of the drying season. The value 

 of the product for a season may be considerably greater than that 

 of the building and its equipment, and the risk of loss from fire is 

 therefore very considerable. There is also great danger of infesta- 

 tion of the entire stock of dry product by insects when fruit is 

 stored adjacent to the workroom, since these pests are attracted by 

 the drying fruit and may easily gain access to the storage room 

 through doors carelessly left open, or through defective screens or 

 cracks in partitions. For these reasons it is strongly advised that the 

 storage room be located in a separate building, far enough from the 

 evaporator to minimize the fire risk. 



Whatever its location, special care should be taken in building 

 the storage room to make floors, walls, and ceiling perfectly tight, 

 as cracks permit entrance of insects and provide shelter for them after 

 they have entered. While some operators make all walls double, 

 this is not necessary if a good grade of properly seasoned matched 

 lumber is used and due care is taken in putting it on. The windows 

 and doors must be provided with accurately fitted screens of heavy, 

 close-meshed mosquito screening; those of the windows should be 

 fastened immovably in place, while those of the doors should be 

 provided with springs to insure prompt closure. The windows 

 should be fitted with shades made of a good grade of opaque material, 

 and as direct sunlight causes discoloration of dried fruits, the shades 

 should be kept down except when work in the room is actually in 

 progress. Adequate provision for ventilation must be made. This 

 can usually be had by partially raising windows along one side of 

 the room while those on the opposite side are lowered from the 

 top. If for any reason this is not possible, floor and ceiling ventilators 

 should be provided. They should be permanently screened and 

 fitted with tightly closing doors, in order that the room may be made 

 practically air-tight when it is necessary to fumigate it. Sudden 

 and extreme changes of temperature and humidity, either upward or 

 downward, should be guarded against by closing the ventilating 

 openings tightly for a sufficient time to permit the room temperature 

 slowly to adjust itself to the changed conditions outside. If the 

 fruit has been sufficiently dried and properly conditioned before 

 being brought into the storage room, such fluctuations of atmospheric 

 humidity and temperature as will occur in the storage room in the 

 course of 3 to 12 months will not noticeably affect it. The fruit at 

 the surface of the mass, if properly cured, will slowly take up 

 moisture during prolonged periods of rainy weather, but will lose 

 the added moisture when dry weather again sets in, the greater part 

 of the mass remaining unaffected. 



The room should be provided with a sufficient number of bins to 

 make it possible to store the different varieties and grades of dried 

 stock separately. If the room can be made of sufficient size to per- 



