PROCEEDINGS OF NINETEENTH FRUIT GROWERS' CONVENTION. 67 



and send them forward, but it is an injury to the whole raisin business. 

 I want it distinctly understood that I do not mean that the second-crop 

 raisin is the best. There is this danger in the second crop: There is 

 always the danger that the early rains will catch the second-crop grapes 

 on the trays. You can generally make only one crop into good raisins. 

 It is said, and I have seen it in the press, that they can be turned into 

 wine. Stop and consider a moment whether 30,000,000 pounds — three 

 times thirty is ninety — over 100,000,000 pounds can be turned into 

 wine. Where are the wineries and cooperage to handle this amount? 



Last summer Muscat wine was sold at from 15 to 16 cents a gallon, 

 and that, too, delivered in San Francisco, which meant 3 cents less to 

 the producer. Later in the season it sold for 25 and 26 cents, as high 

 as 27 cents. If you have a raisin vineyard full of second-crop grapes, 

 what will you take for them? $3 50 to $4 00 a ton? How much is there 

 in $3 50 to $4 00 a ton? What is there left? It is a very easy calcula- 

 tion to prove that it is of more value as a fertilizer. Yet, there is some 

 outlet for it. The proposed combination of sweet wine dealers has 

 brought a demand this year for second-crop Muscat grapes, and if they 

 can turn their whole crop into wine, it is their business to do so. 



Again, there is another outlet. AVithin the last two years, our white 

 grapes have assumed a little more importance in Eastern markets, and 

 this year, in Fresno County, there has been quite a boom in second-crop 

 Muscats. They have been shipped to Chicago and New York, and other 

 Eastern points. We shipped a lot from Sunny side, and made money. 

 They sold at from 95 cents to $1 25. I will say that these grapes were 

 picked with care — extreme care. They were packed in boxes with care. 

 There were springs on the wagons that carried them. They were packed 

 with care, and shipped with care, and they paid. You have to do those 

 things in every line of the fruit business. 



DISCUSSION ON RAISIN CULTURE. 



Question: Have you made anything on late ones? 



Mr. Fowler: There are not a great many Muscatels shipped out of 

 Fresno County; but, take them as a whole, there was a gain; and one 

 shipper that I know of gained on nearly every shipment. There is no 

 greater call for white Muscat grapes this year than in former years. 

 Muscat acreage will be reduced 6 per cent this year. 



Question: Two or three years ago men said that second-crop grapes 

 could be shipped abroad for wine purposes; how about brandies? 



Mr. Fowler: There has been more or less of the second-crop grapes 

 made into brandy. The second-crop grape could be turned into brandy 

 and into Muscatel wine. The question of making brandy out of the 

 Muscat grape has been, and is, a mooted question. Muscat brandy did 

 not sell freely, because of the peculiar musky flavor; but people on the 

 Atlantic coast are beginning to like the Muscat flavor, consequently, 

 there will be some of it produced. Still, I do not know how much. 



Question: Do you know what price the grapes brought? 



Mr. Fowler: They can buy all the grapes they want at from $3 50 

 to $4 50 a ton, delivered at the winery. Some pay one third cash, one 

 third in six months, and the other third in a year. 



