6 
BULLETIN 1261, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 
There is a wide variety of practice with regard to hauling fruit from 
the orchards to the packing house. Many associations have one or 
more trucks, and haul a part of the fruit of their members. The 
remainder is either hauled by the growers, or by transfer trucks hired 
by the growers or the association. The association's charges for 
hauling, as for picking, are intended to cover actual cost of labor, 
maintenance of trucks, depreciation, and fuel and oil expense. A 
sliding-scale charge is usually made; for example, 2\ cents per field 
box for the first mile and 1 cent per box for each additional half mile. 
In most associations the trucks are used for commercial hauling 
at seasons when they are least in demand for hauling fruit, to reduce 
operating expenses. The net cost to the average grower for hauling 
fruit is thus reduced to 2 J to 3^ cents per field box, although wide 
variations exist, caused principally by the varying distances between 
orchards and packing houses. Investigations of the California Fruit 
Growers Exchange show the approximate average cost per packed 
box for hauling citrus fruit from the orchards to the packing Ibouses 
to be as shown in Table 2 for the years indicated: 
Table 2. — Cost of hauling fruit per packed box. 
1910 
1918 
1920 
1921 
Cents. 
2.9 
3.9 
Cents. 
3.7 
5.6 
Cents. 
4.9 
6.7 
Cents. 
4. 6 
5.7 
PACKING-HOUSE OPERATION. 
A representative local unit of the exchange system is a cooperative 
association of from 50 to 200 growers, each owning on the average 
less than 10 acres of bearing orchard. It is to organizations of this 
kind that the discussion in this section chiefly refers, although it is 
applicable in general to individual shippers and packing companies 
affiliated with the exchange. 
MANAGEMENT. 
All except a few of the smallest associations or associations which 
have an exceptionally short shipping season are under the direction 
of a manager who devotes his entire time to the business of the 
organization. The packing-house work is under the immediate 
direction of a foreman, who may have one or more subforeman under 
him. The field work is often under the direction of a general field 
foreman, under whom are picking-crew foremen ; but frequently the 
manager also controls the field work, and the foremen of the picking 
crews are responsible directly to him. In some cases, especially 
in central California, two or more associations unite to employ a 
manager, who, under these conditions, is usually paid a fixed amount 
per box for his services and for furnishing the necessary office help, 
instead of a definite salary. In most associations, however, the 
manager, the foremen, the bookkeeper, and other office help are paid 
definite salaries for 12 months of the year. 
Direct responsibility for all packing-house operations rests upon the 
manager. The manager of an association must be a man of consider- 
