TWENTY-EIGHTH FRUIT -GROWERS' CONVENTION. 



67 



The character of the soil has a very marked effect upon the quality 

 of the fruit produced — much more than on the growth of the trees — 

 ranging from the coarse, thick-skinned, over-acid fruits, usually puffy, 

 grown on the heavy, compact soils slowly impervious to water, to the 

 high-colored, smooth, tender-pulp fruits of the lighter alluvial soils. 



I feel certain that the quality of fruit produced can be materially 

 changed by the addition of proper fertilizers. What they really are, and 

 the best time for applying, can only be determined by careful tests of 

 the orchard plots themselves; and while we have been in the business 

 long enough to have demonstrated this, the fact remains that we have 

 only recently begun these experiments on scientific lines and only in 

 limited numbers, the average grower waiting for the experiment station 

 or others to determine just what is proper to do. I fear we have given 

 too little attention to the use of potash, being misled somewhat by the 

 fact that chemical analysis has shown a fair percentage in the soil; but 

 it is by no means certain that all that can be shown by chemical reac- 

 tion is present in such form as to be readily available for the needs of 

 the tree. 



The fertilizer question may be considered about like the following: 

 Nitrogen, to promote the setting of the fruit; potash and phosphoric 

 acid, for its proper development; and possibly iron, in small quantity, 

 in some of its readily soluble compounds, to add depth to the color. 

 And I am inclined to the desirability of applying them separately in 

 their more concentrated forms rather than in the mixtures. It 

 is hardly safe to depend entirely on stable manure as a means of fer- 

 tilization. Be very careful not to allow trees to show the need of water 

 in November, by waiting for the first rains, with plenty of water at 

 your command, for it will be much more detrimental to the fruit to 

 allow the trees to suffer for water at this time than it would be to allow 

 them to suffer in August. 



A matter of no less importance than the proper growing of fruit, is 

 putting it into the hands of the consumer in a manner to give satisfac- 

 tion; and it is of the greatest consideration that it should carry well. 

 To insure this it must be handled carefully. The usual essayist writes: 

 " Fruit should be handled like eggs," and then recommends that pickers 

 use sacks in which to place the fruit after picking it from the trees; but 

 we never hear of a sack being recommended in which to carry eggs. 

 The pickers generally use the sack with its contents of fruit as a cushion 

 to keep themselves from coming in contact with the ladder; and we 

 frequently see them with the patent open-bottom sack standing erect, 

 allowing the fruit to drop two or more feet to the bottom of a picking- 

 box. Generally the fruit is piled high in the boxes, and when they are 

 moved they are dragged across the tops of each other rather then being 

 lifted so as not to touch the fruit in another box. We are constantly 



