TWENTY-EIGHTH FRUIT-GROWERS' CONVENTION. 



23 



point of importance, and having the California experience they went to 

 Jamaica to exploit the business and introduce California methods; and 

 after two or three seasons they gave it up in disgust and came back. I 

 believe there is nothing to fear from Jamaica. 



MR. BERWICK. Do you know the reason of the failure ? 



MR. ALLEN. They say that the cultivated orchards do not do as 

 well as the old natural orchards — don't produce as good fruit. 



MR. DO RE. How about budding the old orchards ? 



MR. ALLEN. I don't know in detail just how the thing has been 

 conducted. But I do know, or at least I judge from the articles I have 

 read, that it has been tried pretty thoroughly in Jamaica, and by 

 people who had had experience in other localities, t and that they are 

 giving it up in disgust as a failure. And this is said to be the last year 

 of any imports into this country in any considerable quantity. 



PROFESSOR PAINE. I know of an orange-grower in Redlands 

 who was concerned about this, and who made a special visit to Porto 

 Rico this past season in order to learn the orange conditions there; and, 

 without going into details, I learned from him that he was perfectly 

 content to go on with his orange business in Redlands without fear of 

 great competition. 



MR. DORE. Plow much can you produce your oranges for, and 

 what can you get for them ? , Those are the fundamental questions that 

 attract the attention of the practical man who undertakes to find out 

 whether it is profitable, whether it is a permanent assurance of success 

 in the ownership and cultivation, with his own toil and that of his 

 famity, of a limited area in this garden of the world. 



MR. GRIFFITH. The question is asked, "What does it cost to 

 raise oranges ? " The testimony before the Interstate Commerce Com- 

 mission was that it cost anywhere from 85 cents to $1 a box, according 

 to different persons' estimates, plus the freight, to raise, pack, and sell 

 a box of oranges. 



MR. HARTRANFT. How much ? 



MR. GRIFFITH. It costs anywhere from 85 cents to $1 a box and 

 the freight, to raise, pick, haul, pack, and freight, and sell a box of 

 oranges. In other words, if a box of oranges sold at destination for 

 $1.80, it brings 90 cents for the railroad company and 90 cents for the 

 grower. 



MR. STONE. This gentleman has propounded a very vital question, 

 which Mr. Griffith has only partly answered. I doubt very much if 

 there is a man in this room who can tell us what it costs him to raise a 

 box of oranges. We ought to know that, and it seems to me that we 

 are pretty bad business men if we don't know it. My orchard is young. 

 But when it comes into bearing I shall vote myself as pretty much of a 

 dullard if I don't know what it costs me to raise a box of oranges. 



