1330 
for icing and for transferring the cars 
from one road to another. From Miami, 
Fla., to New York the time is approxi- 
mately 96 hours, and from Miami to Chi- 
ecazo about 108 hours. It is thus possible 
for fruit and vegetables grown in regions 
as far away as Southern Florida to be 
delivered to consumers in Chicago or 
New York within five or six days from 
the time of gathering. 
Regularity of Service 
While these fruit and vegetable trains, 
as any others, may be late sometimes, 
nevertheless their regularity is such that 
transactions are reported to be made oft- 
en, if not usually, with the expectation 
that the produce involved will be deliv- 
ered at about a certain time on a certain 
day. For instance, a car of vegetables 
from a South Atlantic shipping point may 
be bought by a dealer, who expects the 
car to reach Jersey City on a Friday night 
in time to be ferried across North river 
to a wholesale market in New York, 
which opens at 1 a. m. Should this car 
be delayed several hours the vegetables 
would miss the Saturday morning market 
and might be delayed two days in reach- 
ing the retail merchants. 
Two instances of delays will serve as 
illustrations. A merchant in Philadel- 
phia mentioned a consignment of straw- 
berries which reached that city from 
Florida six days late, and a Chicago deal- 
er complained, about the same time, of 
losing $500 on a car of strawberries that 
reached him too late to take advantage of 
a good market. Delays like these, it is 
believed, are by no means as frequent 
under present conditions of freight serv- 
ice as in earlier times. 
Extension of Demand and Supply 
Number of Markets 
Inquiries were made by the Bureau of 
Statistics of this department in August, 
1911, as to the different kinds of highly 
perishable fruits and vegetables which 
were received in car lots for local use 
in cities having a population of not less 
than 25,000. Of the 103 cities for which 
reports were made, peaches were sold by 
the carload in at least 87; watermelons, 
ENCYCLOPEDIA OF PRACTICAL HORTICULTURE 
in 86; cantaloupes, 77; bananas, 72; 
strawberries, 71; tomatoes, 66; oranges, 
65; grapes, 53; lemons, 39; pears, 32; 
pineapples, 28; plums, 24; celery, 18; 
cherries, 18; cucumbers, 11; green beans, 
11; apricots, 11; and each of about 25 
other commodities of this class were re- 
ported to have car-lot markets in from 
1 to 10 different cities. The reports on 
which these figures are based are probably 
incomplete to a greater or less degree; 
some products are no doubt omitted which 
should have been included. If it had 
been possible to secure complete lists 
of all such products for each of these 
cities, the figures just given would prob- 
ably have been larger. As they stand, 
these incomplete figures show a wide 
range of markets where car-lot shipments 
of fresh fruits and vegetables may be 
sold. The producer has many good out- 
lets for his crops; if market conditions 
in one place are not satisfactory, there 
may be other places where fair prices 
may be obtained. The cities which ab- 
sorb these products by the carload in- 
clude many whose population is less than 
50,000. Of the 87 car-lot markets for 
peaches in which returns were made in 
this investigation, 30 were cities of less 
than 50,000 inhabitants; 23 of these 
smaller cities took cantaloupes by the 
carload, 19 received grapes and straw- 
berries, and 17 received tomatoes. Other 
products of this class also found sale in 
car lots among these smaller cities. 
The number of car-lot markets for 
fruits and vegetables has increased great- 
ly during the past decade. This is in- 
dicated by reports made by railroad 
freight agents and produce dealers in 
various cities as to the year in which 
the first carloads of certain products 
were received for local use. The products 
for which the fullest reports were made 
were peaches, strawberries, cantaloupes, 
tomatoes, and grapes. Of the 42 mar- 
kets which reported the year when the 
first carload of peaches was received for 
local use, 13 had become car-lot mar- 
kets within the past decade: the mar- 
kets whose first carload sale of straw- 
berries was made since 1900 numbered 
