FLORIDA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY 
203 
to be precooled and the length of season 
during which it can be operated. There 
are in operation several warehouse plants 
in California, designed for the precooling 
of oranges, built and operated by grow¬ 
ers’ associations. Figures compiled by 
the Citrus Protective League of that state 
give the average cost of precooling and 
injitial icing in these various plants at 
$32.5° per car. This, in addition to the 
$7.50 charge for the use of the refriger¬ 
ator car, makes a total refrigeration 
charges of $40 per car. The cooling is 
accomplished in from 36 to 72 hours in 
the different plants. 
The Department has designed several 
ice and salt plants now in operation 
by associations shipping two to three 
cars a day of berries and decid¬ 
uous fruits. The refrigeration is ob¬ 
tained by drawing air through a mixture 
of crushed ice and salt. The cold air is 
distributed in the precooling rooms and 
through false floors giving rather equita- 
able cooling and the system! is effective 
and entirely practicable where ice can be 
obtained at a reasonable figure. The cost 
of construction is relatively low, the insu¬ 
lated rooms being the principal item. 
Practically no machinery is required aside 
from the electric motors and fans and no 
skilled labor necessary in its operation. 
The cost of precooling with this type of 
plant is therefore dependent largely on 
the cost of ice. 
ORANGE PRECOOLING EXPERIMENTS IN 
FLORIDA IQ 1 3- 1 4. 
The precooling experiments with 
oranges were carried on at Palmetto, 
Florida, the fruit for precooling being 
obtained from the surrounding section in 
Manatee County. Conditions over which 
we had no control made it impossible for 
us to carry on these investigations in 
just ithe way we had planned. On ac¬ 
count of crop and market conditions it 
was impracticable to obtain any number 
of cars going to the same market, and 
during the major portion of the season 
it was not even possible to have the pre¬ 
cooled and the comparable check cars sent 
to any one point. This made it necessary 
to make the inspections at Washington, 
forwarding the experimental lots by ex¬ 
press from the different points to which 
the cars were consigned. The differ¬ 
ence in the time of arrival -and the differ¬ 
ent lengths of haul by express in many in¬ 
stances made impossible a correct deter¬ 
mination of the effects of precooling on 
the particular lots. The difference be¬ 
tween the precooled and the non- 
precooled lots very often were not dis¬ 
cernible by the time the fruit reached 
Washington, the comparable lots arriv¬ 
ing sometimes a week or more apart. The 
conditions above mentioned made it neces¬ 
sary to discard a number of shipments in 
making up the data. We have, however, 
a fairly good line on the effects of pre¬ 
cooling in the holding lots held at Pal¬ 
metto. Comparable lots in the precooled 
and non-precooled series were held in a 
fully iced car at Palmetto' to check up the 
results of the shipping experiments. 
These holding lots of both precooled and 
check series furnished the most dependa¬ 
ble data we have this season on the effect 
of precooling. These were all held in the 
