CALIFORNIA AVOCADO ASSOCIATION 



79 



"Regarding the sale of immature avocados, I deprecate it. In these 

 young years of the industry, it should not be done." 



"I am decidedly of the opinion that the injury to the market, due to 

 the selling of immature avocados is very serious and widespread, and it 

 must be that many people who taste an unripe avocado, having paid a high 

 price for it, are prejudiced against the fruit and deterred from buying 

 again." 



"In the cultivation of the taste of the public for avocados I believe 

 there is much injurious work done by selling immature fruits. I do not think 

 the present market has been greatly injured because there is so much greater 

 demand them supply, but I believe the appreciation of the public, and espe- 

 cially the cultivation of the taste, is greatly injured by the immature fruits 

 that have gone out. These fruits have sold at good prices because the pub- 

 lic in buying them thought they were getting ripe avocados. Naturally, 

 finding the fruits inferior, the people who bought them will value the avo- 

 cado accordingly, and have a poor opinion of it instead of a good one. An 

 adverse opinion is more difficult to overcome than a low price. I believe 

 we should take a strong stand on this subject of putting green fruits on the 

 market. There is and can be no justification for this practice, and all 

 growers should feel too much interest in the future of the industry to take 

 a hand in dealings of this nature." 



"I think the sale of immature avocados one of the greatest menaces 

 to the future success of the industry and a maturity standard most desir- 

 able." 



"I am sure it will be hard to get the people who have purchased im- 

 mature fruits ever to try again and therefore it would seem to me that the 

 market was damaged to the extent and amount such fruit has been sold. 

 Certainly it should not be practiced if there is any way to stop or check it." 



"I think that it is a very serious injury to the development of the mar- 

 ket for avocados, to have undeveloped fruit offered on the market. It is 

 especially harmful because the average salesman and customer are not cap- 

 able of judging whether a fruit is good or not. I doubt if any legal method 

 could be arrived at at the present time by which a maturity standard could 

 be enforced, but think that a remedy probably lies in the education of pro- 

 duce men, and the development of a better standard among the growers." 



That there is another side to this question, however, is indicated by 

 the following letter: 



"In answering yours of April 25 th, I have to acknowledge that my 

 ideas in regard to the value of immature avocados have been very much 

 disturbed by things which have occurred during the past winter." 



"When some growers marketed fruit which had been blown off the 

 trees and which seemed to me should have remained on the trees from three 

 to four months longer to bring them to perfection, I was quite indignant and 

 felt that the persons who bought the fruit at the retailer's had been very 

 unjustly dealt with. 



"I have had to modify my opinion very materially, as I have had a 

 remarkable evidence of the value of avocado fruit even many months before 

 it was thoroughly ripe. An orchard at Whittier had among its trees a 

 Murrieta Green, the fruit of which is not expected to mature before July 

 or August. The top of this tree, bearing twenty odd fruits, was acciden- 

 tally blown off and the broken part thrown aside. The fruits were not even 



