FLORIDA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
75 
CHART V. 
Summary—Market Storage Tests. 
Time of Inspection 
Sound, carefully handled 
On arrival. 
, M After 1 week 
O 
CO 
p* 
V 
<u 
£ 
u 
<L> 
4-» 
*4-1 
< 
4-5 
Dropped 18 inches. 
2.3 
6.0 
10.9 
Through machinery. 
1.1 
5-4 
12.4 
Commercial pack. 
3-.9 
10.6 
18.1 
Mechanically injured.. . . 
20.2 
38.0 
52.4 
The boxes from which the injured 
fruit has been removed, although the or¬ 
anges may have been dropped just pre¬ 
vious to packing arrived in reasonably 
good condition. The trip was sufficiently 
short so that the bruised fruit apparently 
did not have time to decay and it reached 
the destination with but a slight amount 
of loss in excess of the carefuHy handled 
boxes. The commercial pack having 
some injured oranges showed more 
waste, yet not arriving in a bad condition. 
The injured boxes averaged 20 per cent, 
rotten. 
At the end of the first week the decay in 
the carefully handled lots has but slightly 
increased while that of the bruised fruit 
jumps up to over 5 or 6 per cent. The 
commercial pack has reached the high 
figure of over 10 per cent. The injured 
fruit shows 38 per cent loss. At the end 
of the second week the carefully handled 
series remain still practically sound. All 
other lots show heavy losses. The com¬ 
mercial pack at that time had nearly one- 
fifth waste while over one-half of the in¬ 
jured fruit has decayed. 
Among the results shown by this chart 
there is a confirmation of the belief held 
by the fruit trade in general that it is not 
a safe thing to handle Florida oranges 
for even if there is but little decay on 
arrival, the fruit will not hold sufficiently 
long for the retailer to sell his stock. 
There is probably no other one thing 
that has more to do with low prices or 
small demand for Florida fruit at any 
time than this. The quality of the fruit 
is such, and the texture and general ap¬ 
pearance so good, that there should be 
a healthy demand for your fruit through¬ 
out the season. But as long as the buyer 
must figure on losing perhaps one-quar¬ 
ter or even one-half of a box by decay, 
if it is necessary for him to hold it some 
days, he cannot afford to handle such 
fruit if there is on the market a brand 
which he is sure will hold an equally long 
time with but a slight amount of waste. 
The sound, carefully handled lots shipped 
this season answer all his requirements. 
Is it possible then, to handle your fruit 
in any better way than is being done at 
present? Chart VI gives the results of 
some educational work done among the 
pickers. 
CHART VI. 
4-1 
3 
o 
u 
<U 
>> 
V. 
3 
O r A 
a 
a 
a c 
Before inspection work. 
0 
0 c 
h nj m 
December 4 . 
7-4 
18 0 
December 6 . 
5.6 
22.0 
After inspection work. 
December 17. 
2.3 
•6.0 
December 27 . 
1.0 
4-0 
The first half of the chart gives the 
percentages of clipper-cuts in one gang at 
four different inspections, the first two 
at the time our Department representa¬ 
tive began his work. The last inspec¬ 
tions show what successful results he 
obtained. Within a month the average 
amount of clipper cutting was reduced 
to 1 per cent., a very fine record. The 
last part of the chart gives results on 
the total injuries made in the picking and 
in addition the number of long stems 
left. On the fourth and sixth of Decem¬ 
ber the average was 20 per cent; three 
