April 1, 1902.] THE TROPICAL AGEICULTUEIST. 
659 
ORANGES CULTURE, PICKING AND 
PACKING IN JAMAICA 
Being Paper read by Hon. Dr. Johnston, at the 
First Orange Conference held under the 
auspices of the Board of Jgriculture at 
the Collegiate Hall, Kingstoti, on 
. Wednesday, ZOth October, 1901. 
In approaching the subject of orange culture) 
picking and packing for shipment, it is with no 
desire on my part to pose as an authority on the 
question, or to pit my opinion against those of the 
experienced planter to whom a knowledge of fruit 
growing and handling rightly belongs, but, having 
lived for many years in one of the finest fruit-pro- 
ducing parishes in the Island, and being impressed 
with the importance of the industry, and the 
necessity for its development being placed on a 
sound and permanent basis, I have been led for 
some time past to take a personal interest in the 
matter, and to do what little I can to secure this 
much-to-be-desired end. For while we may all be 
agreed that sugar must ever remain the staple pro- 
duct of the colony, (hear, hear,) and that in its 
revival, by means of reasonable preferential con- 
cessions on the part of the Imperial Government, 
and the establishment of Central Factories, lies the 
only hope for Jamaica's future prosperity, we must 
not lose sight of the fact that hundreds of our 
people depend on the frequent visits of the fruit 
steamers to our shores, whereby to realise a little 
ready money to meet their most pressing needs and 
the call of the tax-collector. 
Hitherto, our fruit shipping experiences have 
been confined chiefly to the comparatively near 
markets of the United States and Canada. The 
short sea voyage and the expeditious transit of our 
oranges to these countries have in some measure 
obviated the necessity for very special care in 
handling and packing, although we have seen, more 
than once, hundreds of barrels of Jamaica oranges 
in an unsaleable condition on the wharves of New 
York through careless packing, while everywhere 
we heard grocers complaining that, even if our 
fruit arrived sound, the unattractive appearance 
of our packages and the slovenly method of putting 
up the fruit, adopted by us, precluded the possi- 
bility of our oranges ever taking rank with the 
Florida and Californian products until we were 
persuaded to bestow more time and care in prepar- 
ing them for the market. 
The Problem. — But now, gentlemen, we are 
face to face with the problem of how to pick and 
pack our oranges so as to carry successfully more 
than three times the distance to the States and a 
voyage of twelve to fourteen days instead of four or 
five ; for the markets of the Mother Country are 
now open to us by the inauguration of the Direct 
Line of specially fitted steamers, affording facilities 
for shipping fruit to England never offered to us 
before, while we have practically the field to our- 
selves until much later. Could we but place our 
fruit in good condition at Covent Gaiden now, 
high prices could be assured, for our Jamaica 
oranges for quality have no peer, and the fault is 
our own that their reputation in England is not 
better than it is. In confirmation of this statement, 
permit me to quote from a letter received by last 
mail from a larg« fruit-dealer in Liverpool. He 
writes: — "We have been badly in need of oranges 
for the last three months, and will be for some 
tijiio to coaie. Barrels from Jamaica turn out ■ 
83 
very wasty, but we may hope for better packag«3 
in future. With you, I sincerely trust, the pros- 
perity of Jamaica will, in near future, greatly 
improve, but I also know this improvement can 
only be accomplished by diligent and persevering 
energy on both sides of the Atlantic." The difficul- 
ties are many, but they are not insurmountable, 
and as the Italian, Sicilian and Spanish orange 
packers contend successfully with a long sea voyage 
and extremes of temperature, so can we ; and it 
might be well for us to review briefly the methods, 
adopted by them, whieh have resulted in bringing 
vast wealth to Messina and Palermo, while whole 
cities have sprung up on the East coast of Spain 
during the past thirty or forty years, as the result 
of an orange industry conducted on business 
principles. Under order from Mr. A. L. Jones, it 
was my privilege to spend some three weeks in 
Spain, my instructions being to visit Italy, Sicily, 
Algiers or wherever else I would be likely to gain 
information that might be of value to the orange 
shippers of Jamaica. On ^reaching Valencia, I 
learned that the season had practically closed further 
East, so determined to confine my investigations to 
the region within a couple of hundred miles of 
Valencia, where three or four weeks still remained 
before the crop would be finished. My first visit 
was to the orange groves, or orchards, of Burianna, 
accompanied by an interpreter and guide provided 
by Messrs. Reis Bros., a firm of high standing apd 
doing a larger business, probably, in oranges than 
any other house in Spain, and were therefore in a 
position to afiord me special facilities in my hunt 
for knowledge. 
In the Field, — On entering the orange field, I 
was struck by the amount of labour put into the 
land ; every inch is ploughed by a crude, primitive 
and ancient-looking wooden implement, the share 
alone being tipped with iron which turns up a very 
shallow furrow efiectively, however, stirring up the 
soil and keeping down the weeds, although the 
work could be much more speedily and efiectively 
accomplished by one of our modern American culti- 
vators. Not in every plantation in Jamaica can 
this suggestion be adopted, as much of our orang«s 
grow in the pimento walks, and pasture lands, and 
the idea, therefore, would apply to only such flelda 
as are entirely given over to orange culture. One 
thing, however, 'applies to orange-growing any 
and everywhere, — if the planter would improve the 
character and condition of his trees, and the quality 
of his fruit — he must at least fork up the soil 
within a radius of six feet round each tree ; a trench 
12 inches wide, six inches deep, at ,a distance vary* 
ing according to the size of the tree and the reach 
of the limbs, filled with manure, is a very good half- 
way measure. I also observed that a circular hole 
is dug round the roots of each tree, the earth being 
drawn back some two feet, forming a basin-shaped 
hollow, exposing the roots some 18 or 20 inches 
from th(j trunk. The reason given for this is, first, 
that insect borers, etc., are more liable to attack 
the roots near the trunk of the tree, and the expo- 
sure of at this point leaves them no shelter, and 
their operations are more rapidly detected ; secondly, 
it was found in the early experience of Spanish 
orange growers that a gum disease, in the form of 
a gummy or resinous deposit, accumulated and 
formed between the earth and the air on the tree 
which ultimately caused the bark to rot, with the 
result that 60 per cent, of the trees died in the 4th 
and 5th year of their growth, while in other oases 
portions of the trees would wither away. Now, 
