180 PROCEEDINGS OF THIRTY-SIXTH FRUIT-GROWERS' CONVENTION. 



It has been shown that the different kinds of molds which cause the 

 most common forms of decay in fruits while in transit and in storage 

 are unable to penetrate the sound, normal, skin of the fruit. These 

 molds generally gain entrance through mechanical abrasions produced 

 in the preparation of the fruit for market. It is not unusual to find 

 10 per cent of apples showing cuts or abrasions in the skin. Small 

 fruits are more commonly injured,, while oranges frequently show from 

 10 to 50 per cent of the fruit with the skin cut by the clippers in 

 severing it from the trees or by rough handling of the fruit in the 

 packing houses. It has been demonstrated that by careful handling in 

 the picking and packing of oranges under commercial conditions the 

 injuries can be overcome, and the decay can be almost wholly eliminated. 



During the past four years the storage investigations have been 

 extended to the table grape industry of California. These investi- 

 gations were started with two main objects in view: A study of the 

 factors which affect the keeping quality of grapes in transit and 

 storage and the possibility of extending the markets and season of Cali- 

 fornia grapes, ultimately with the hope of replacing the two million 

 dollar importations of fresh Spanish grapes with the California-grown 

 product held in common or cold storage. At present practically the 

 entire Tokay grape crop has to be marketed within sixty days. Within 

 a few years the output of this variety will nearly double. The neces- 

 sity of either extending the season of marketing or of developing new 

 markets becomes of vital importance. 



COLD STORAGE EXPERIMENTS. 



Our first efforts were directed toward the storage problems, and the 

 results obtained in this work had a direct bearing on the transporta- 

 tion problems which were to follow later. A careful study of the 

 behavior of a number of important grape varieties was begun. Some 

 of these were grown commercially, some were not, and were included 

 in the experiments to determine their suitability for introduction to 

 commercial vineyards. The list of varieties includes the following, most 

 of which were obtained from the University Experiment Station near 

 Tulare, through the courtesy of the California station officials : Flame 

 Tokay. Muscat. Mallaga. Thompson Seedless. Ferrara. Emperor. Verdal. 

 Black Prince, Cornichon. Huaseo, Bowood. Pizzutella, Perruno. Chas- 

 selas de Fontainebleau. Sabalskanski. and Almeria. Last year and the 

 present season varieties from Lodi included the following: Flame 

 Tokay, Emperor. Ferrara. Verdal, and Cornichon. This season a num- 

 ber of new varieties grown on the Government experimental vineyards 

 at Fresno and Oakville were added to the list, but as this work is only 

 begun these varieties need not be named here. 



The preliminary work included a test of different methods of pack- 

 ing: In crates without filling, and in tight boxes with various filling 

 materials in comparison with ground cork, such as is used with the 

 Almeria grapes imported from Spain. The list of packing materials, 

 besides the ground cork, included paper, both shredded and as a 

 wrapper, wheat bran, corn meal, ground corn pith, shredded and cut 

 tule and redwood sawdust. All of these substitutes, except redwood 

 sawdust, have been found unsuitable and have been abandoned. Red- 



