Page 48 



BETTER FRUIT 



HOOD RIVER, OREGON 

 Official Organ of 

 The Northwest Fruit Growers' Association 

 A Monthly Illustrated Magazine 

 Published in the Interest of Modern 

 Fruit Growing and Marketing 

 All Communications Should Be Addressed and 

 Remittances Made Payable to 



Better Fruit Publishing Company 



E. H. SHEPARD 

 Editor and Publisher 

 C. R. Greisen, Assistant Editor 

 H. E. Van Deman, Contributing Editor 

 State Associate Editors 



OREGON 



A. B. CoRDLEY, Entomologist, Corvallis 

 C. I. Lewis, Horticulturist, Corvallis 

 P. J. O'Gara, Pathologist and Entomologist, 

 Medford 



WASHINGTON 



W. S. Thornber, Horticulturist, Pullman 

 A. L. Melander, Entomologist, Pullman 



COLORADO 



C. p. Gillette, Director and ■■Entomologist, 

 Fort Collins 



E. B. House, Chief of Department of Civil and 

 Irrigation Engineering, State Agricultural 

 College, Fort Collins 

 E. P. Taylor, Horticulturist, Grand Junction 



IDAHO 



\V. H. Wicks, Horticulturist, Moscow 



UTAH 



Dr. E. D. Ball, Director and Entomologist, Logan 

 Leon D. Batchelor, Horticulturist, Logan 



MONTANA 



O. B. Whipple, Horticulturist, Bozeman 



CALIFORNIA 



C. W. WooDWORTH, Entomologist, Berkeley 

 W. H. VoLCK, Entomologist, Watsonville 



BRITISH COLUMBIA 



R. M. WiNSLOw, Provincial Horticulturist, Victoria 

 SUBSCRIPTION PRICE $1.00 PER YEAR 



In Advance, in United States and Canada 

 Foreign Subscriptions, Including Postage, $1.50 



Advertising Rates on Application 

 Entered as second-class matter December 27, igo6, 

 at the Post Office at Hood River, Oregon, 

 under Act of Congress of March 3, iSyg. 



THE editorial space of "Better Fruit" 

 is always considered one of our 

 strong features. There are several broad 

 and important problems before the fruit 

 growers of the Northwest today which 

 are entitled to editorial space, but 

 instead of discussing them editorially it 

 seems wisest to publish the contributed 

 articles which have been sent in, for the 

 reason that these contributed articles 

 cover the subjects more forcefully and 

 more thoroughly than they might be 

 covered by the editor of "Better Fruit." 

 Therefore, we call the attention of the 

 readers to the following articles, in lieu 

 of editorials, which appear elsewhere in 

 this edition: 



"The Central Selling Agency for the 

 Northwest Fruits," so ably handled by 

 H. O. Stechhan, who has been in close 

 touch with H. W. Otis, chairman of the 

 executive committee appointed at Walla 

 Walla conference in February. Else- 

 where in this edition will also be found 

 the general plan for central exchange as 

 adopted by Walla Walla delegates. The 

 editor of "Better Fruit," having just 

 returned from California, being detained 

 by illness, was unable to attend this 

 meeting. It is understood that this gen- 

 eral plan will be presented to the indi- 

 vidual districts for approval or correc- 

 tion, and will again be presented at a 

 meeting of these delegates at some place 

 in the near future. So far the place has 

 not been designated nor the date set, but 



BETTER FRUIT 



it is understood that another meeting of 

 delegates will be called, of which due 

 notice will be given, some time in April. 

 Especial attention is called to the "Reso- 

 lutions and Rules Applying to Storage 

 in Transit of Apples," adopted by a 

 conference composed of delegates of the 

 Western Fruit Jobbers' Association, the 

 National League of Commission Mer- 

 chants and the National Apple Shippers' 

 Association. Another article touching 

 this matter is a set of resolutions, which 

 appears in this edition, adopted by a 

 committee of the Central Selling Agency 

 of the Northwest fruits. On this same- 

 subject we publish an article entitled, 

 "Storage in Transit," being a review of 

 the situation, which appeared in the 

 "Spy," a journal published in the inter- 



April 



ests of the National Apple Shippers' 

 Association. 



After careful perusal of all these 

 articles they must be conceded to be of 

 vital importance to the fruit growers of 

 the Northwest. Each and every one of 

 these articles, by men thoroughly famil- 

 iar with the situation, handle the respec- 

 tive subjects in such an able manner that 

 it leaves but little for editorial comment, 

 and they are published in this issue com- 

 plete, without any alterations. 



The editor, having been in California 

 for some time, and his time having been 

 taken up on other matters that could not 

 be postponed, feels that he is insuffici- 

 ently informed on the subjects treated 

 to warrant further editorial elucidation. 



CENTRAL SELLING AGENCY for NORTHWEST FRUITS 



BY H. O. STECHHAN 



thrashing out the scheme each one was 



NO movement among any body of 

 men engaged in soil culture ever 

 undertaken heretofore promises tn have 

 such far-reaching beneficial effects all 

 around as the projected organization of 

 the fruit growers of Washington, Ore- 

 gon, Idaho and R'lontana for the handling 

 of their crops through one central selling 

 agency. No improper methods of con- 

 trol are contemplated which might be 

 construed to operate in restraint of trade. 

 The whole purpose is to create a sys- 

 tem of distribution that will eliminate 

 disastrous competition among those 

 whose interests are identical, thereby 

 putting the horticultural industry of the 

 Northwest on a sound business basis; in 

 accordance with its just deserts. 



The present value of the crop to be 

 handled has been estimated at $10,000,000, 

 but there is no definite information on 

 the subject. That brings up another 

 imperative need for this organization, 

 viz., the gathering of information con- 

 cerning the fruit growing industry so 

 that it will be available for all persons 

 connected with the business, to be used 

 by them intelligently, just like the lum- 

 bermen, the cotton interests and wool 

 growers ha-^'e been able to advance their 

 prosperity through similar co-operative 

 efforts. 



Without doubt most fruit growers in 

 the Northwest today have been making 

 a profit, but when it is taken into con- 

 sideration that a steadily increasing acre- 

 age will begin to yield marketable stuff 

 in the next five and ten years the neces- 

 sity for some means of distributing intel- 

 ligently the increasing output will be 

 seen. To this end it is essential that the 

 producer be made independent of the 

 middleman, who controls the situation 

 now, frequently to the disadvantage of 

 the grower, the dealer and the con- 

 sumer as well. 



At the conference of Northwest fruit 

 growers recently held in Walla Walla, 

 following the preliminary meeting in 

 Portland, a tentative form of organiza- 

 tion was agreed upon, which follows the 

 suggestions made some years ago by 

 Secretary of Agriculture James Wilson. 

 An executive committee was named, 

 consisting of representatives of all the 

 fruit districts in the Northwest. After 



instructed to take it up with the home 

 association of growers and to report back 

 at a subsequent meeting which is to be 

 held in April. H. W. Otis, of Wenat- 

 chee, was made chairman of the execu- 

 tive committee. In advocating the cen- 

 tral selling agency as offering relief to 

 all fruit growers Mr. Otis emphasizes 

 the fact that the plan is not a hastily 

 formed scheme, but the result of care- 

 fully studying conditions that have con- 

 fronted all agriculturists for years. As 

 one of the foremost growers of the 

 Wenatchee Valley, where he has brought 

 a large orchard into bearing, Mr. Otis 

 speaks with authority. 



Ill the accompanying authorized inter- 

 view Mr. Otis seeks to put before the 

 readers of "Better Fruit" compactly just 

 what the organization is and intends to 

 do. He says: 



"No outside promoters or influences 

 have any part in the attempt to line up 

 the fruit growers of the Northwest to put 

 the orchard industry on a sound basis. 

 By this movement the growers merely 

 wish the privilege of handling direct that 

 which they are producing instead of tak- 

 ing the blind chances of delegating the 

 distribution to produce speculators. The 

 plan of organization adopted at Walla 

 Walla is the outgrowth of definite condi- 

 tions confronting the growers in the 

 Northwest. It is true that the most of 

 them have been making money up to 

 date, but in the face of a steadily increas- 

 ing output every year it becomes neces- 

 sary to take steps to develop new mar- 

 kets systematically to insure consump- 

 tion of the large crops that will be raised 

 on their increasing acreage in the next 

 five and ten years. 



"The entire lack of co-operation on the 

 part of orchard men in the various dis- 

 tricts, in the face of identical interests, 

 the total absence of intelligent or sys- 

 tematic distribution, with the attendant 

 evils of disastrous competition among 

 the districts, have made the markets 

 undependable and fluctuating. The result 

 has been invariably the source of loss 

 to the dealer as well as the grower. As 

 a remedy it is proposed that district asso- 

 ciations shall be formed, as already exist 



Continued on page 51 



