February, 1909.] 



147 



Edible Products. 



PACKING AND SHIPPING 

 OF FRUITS. 



The Avocado, 



First, we will consider the avocado, 

 which has always been considered a 

 difficult fruit to ship, I do not consider 

 it such. I consider that the avocado is 

 a comparatively easy fruit to ship if it 

 is handled in the proper way. 



The picking of the fruit should be 

 done within as short a time as possible 

 previous to the sailing of the steamer. 

 The avocado begins to soften very 

 rapidly after it is picked, and as soon 

 as that softening process begins, your 

 troubles begin. You cannot then arrest 

 successfully the maturing process and 

 preserve the fruit. You should get 

 it into cold storage as rapidly as 

 possible after picking, and I would say 

 that under our present facilities it is 

 not quite safe to pick the fruit and 

 place it in cold storage and then take 

 it out to put it in the steamer, because 

 the refrigerating compartment of the 

 steamer, where you put youc fruit in, 

 has to be kept open for the reception of 

 other fruit, and your fruit which has 

 become chilled then becomes warmed 

 again and then chilled, and these rauid 

 changes in temperature are greatly con- 

 ducive to the deterioration of the fruit. 

 The fruit should be cut with great care 

 so as to avoid bruising. Perhaps it 

 seems superfluous to say this, yet I have 

 «een people who are in the fruit business 

 handling avocados in a way in which 

 a good down-east farmer would not 

 treat his potatoes ; I have seen them 

 packed in boxes and specimens dropped 

 from this height (indicating about 3A to 

 4 feet) on to a concrete pavement floor 

 and then picked up and put in the 

 boxes as first-class merchantable avo- 

 cados. That won't do- They must be 

 handled with extreme care to avoid all 

 bruising. The stems should be cut, as 

 I have told you should be done in the 

 case of oranges and lemons. Cut the 

 stem comparatively near to the fruit 

 and don't put in leaves — do not cut the 

 stems long so as to include the leaves ; 

 about a quarter of an inch or an eighth 

 of an inch is sufficient, that is, beyond 

 the natural joint. The packing should 

 be done also with care. I have brought 

 here a few crates to illustrate the dif- 

 ferent possible packages, This crate (in- 

 dicating) holds approximately twenty- 

 four avocados. There is a smaller crate 

 which we have used which holds a 

 dozen. It is exactly the same as half 

 of this. This crate is more useful in 

 sending smaller shipments that are going 

 for private orders, In this crate you 

 will see that the fruits are only one tier 



deep. All fruit should be wrapped with 

 rather thin and yet strong paper. They 

 should be placed so as to pack snugly. 

 If you will recall the shape of the 

 average avocado you will notice that it 

 can be adjusted to a box of this size, 

 even though it be a little smaller in dia- 

 meter or a little larger. The ad j ustment 

 can be done by means of tilting. If the 

 avocado is long you can place it like 

 that (indicating) if it is wide, it can be 

 tilted a little lower and the next one be 

 put this way (indicating) ; if this is point 

 up, the next one can be point down, and 

 you can tilt it just as much as is neces- 

 sary, the only requisite of the box being 

 that it must be high enough to receive 

 the avocado if it is lying directly on its 

 side. These boxes we found were not 

 quite large enough to receive the largest 

 avocados. I would say, do not put any 

 paper between the fruits. I found in 

 San Francisco thac many of our shippers 

 from here were sending the fruits up 

 there in orange crates and larger boxes 

 than that and packing paper, wads of 

 paper, in between the fruts. Doubtless 

 the idea was to keep the fruit from bruis- 

 ing, but what is the result? You have 

 a solid mass of fruit and paper packed 

 closely together ; the circulation of air 

 is rendered impossible, and it is about 

 like trying to refrigerate a wad of 

 cotton — you can't get the refrigeration 

 into it; rather you can't get the heat 

 out of it, you do not get the circulation 

 of the air, the cold air, about the fruit. 

 And there is no need of this paper if the 

 fruit is carefully placed so as to be snug. 

 Do not put in any leaves. The shipping 

 must be in refrigeration only. When 

 we first commenced shipping, people 

 told us that we could not ship in 

 refrigeration without the fruit all turn- 

 ing black. That depends upon the 

 refrigeration. But ventilation is out of 

 the question, ventilation without refri- 

 geration is out of the question— the 

 fruit will all arrive in the market 

 in a condition too soft to be received 

 by the wholesale trade. A great deal 

 of it may arrive there in suitable con- 

 dition for eating, but the trade will not 

 take it in that form. The avocado will 

 endure refrigeration for a term of 

 three weeks any way. The exact time 

 we have not determined, but we have 

 determined that it will not endure 

 refrigeration as long as most temperate 

 zone fruits. The first deteriorating 

 effect of refrigeration is observable in 

 the darkening of the flesh close to the 

 seed, and then the flesh begins to turn 

 rancid ; but it is perfectly safe to send 

 them as far as San Francisco or as far 

 as New York, so far as the time ele- 

 ment is concerned. The temperatures 



