302 
American Agriculturist, March 31,19^3 
Reviewing the Latest Eastern Markets and Prices 
EGG SHIPMENTS INCREASING 
H. H. JONES 
A S prophesied on this page several 
weeks ago, the egg market held up 
remarkably during the month, of March 
compared with last year. This was due 
to the extra demand for Easter and 
Jewish Passover holidays, which Came 
earlier this year, and to the succession 
of cold waves and storms since January 
1, Receipts began to increase consider¬ 
ably the third week in March, but total 
receipts at New York for the period of 
January 1 to date were still 33,000 
cases below those in the same period 
last year. Stocks of Western eggs in 
transit were reported liberal. 
The pre-Easter demand was chiefly 
for fancy graded stock, especially large- 
size white eggs. Express shipments 
from nearby sections have increased 
gradually, but qualities have not im¬ 
proved, many of best eggs apparently 
being culled for incubator use. The 
highest grades advanced and were sold 
promptly, but average and ordinary 
stock tended to accumulate. 
Storing has started in the larger 
markets, but the amount stored so far 
has been insignificant. At New York, 
March 22, there were only 3,549 cases 
of eggs in cold storage, compared with 
63,859 cases on the same date last year. 
The storage season will really begin 
after April 1, but the movement in the 
first half of April cannot be as heavy 
as last year. The chances are that the 
bottom price of eggs for this season 
will come after May 1. 
Consumption continues to increase in 
spite of the way prices have held up, 
and the output through New York 
wholesale channels in the week ending 
March 17 was actually higher than in 
the corresponding week of 1922, and 
very much above the previous week. 
The big chain stores were advertising 
fresh eggs as low as 29c per dozen to 
the consumer last week, and very gen¬ 
erally around 30 to 34c. These eggs 
were chiefly Pacific Coasts. 
At this time last year extra fancy 
nearby hennery whites sold at 35 to 
37c, compared with 39 to 41c last week. 
Nearby hennery browns, extra fancy, 
last year were 29% to 30c, compared" 
with S4c on March 22 this year. 
CABBAGE NOW WEAKER 
More liberal receipts of State Danish 
variety cabbage, heavy importations 
from Holland and increasing arrivals 
of Southern new cabbage caused a much 
weaker market last week, and the peak 
of prices for this season has undoubt¬ 
edly been passed. Old cabbage is espe¬ 
cially weaker, and State Danish sold on 
March 22 at $35 to $38 per ton. Open¬ 
ing up of country roads will probably 
cause still more liberal shipments and 
bring prices lower. New cabbage is 
now arriving from Texas, Louisiana, 
Florida, South Carolina and California. 
POTATOES CONTINUE UPWARD 
Because of bad roads and transporta¬ 
tion difficulties, up-State potatoes in 
New York City markets worked higher 
last week. States in 150-lb. sacks sold 
from $3 to $3.50 for the best stock. 
Poor much lower. Demand good. Of¬ 
ferings were very light. 
Bulk sold from $1.80 to $2 cwt., de¬ 
livered in carlots; 150-lb. sacks quoted 
from $3 to $3.50 for prompt shipment. 
Maines offered at $2.25 to $2.35 cwt., 
bulk carlots, delivered. Long Islands 
sold as high as $6 for 180 lbs. Demand 
exceeding supply. 
Potatoes from Minnesota and Wis¬ 
consin are rolling to New York at 
prices ranging from $2.25 per 150-lb. 
sack to $3.15. Quality good. Some 
fancy Virginia second-crop barrels have 
arrived and first car Florida Spaulding 
Rose of the season came forward on 
Tuesday of this week. Best grades, 
sold well at firm prices, with Virginia 
Red Bliss generally commanding $6 
and Floridas selling at $12 per bbl. for 
No. Is and $8 for No. 2s. 
ONION SUPPLIES LIBERAL 
The usual active market for onions 
just before Easter and the Passover 
promises to be well supplied this year. 
Receipts were so liberal that prices 
were very irregular last week. On 
March 22 best Central and Western 
N. Y. yellows No. 1 sold at $3.25 to 
$3.50 per^O-lb. bag,^ with a few fancy 
at $3.75 to $4, and ordinary at $2.50 to 
$3. Best red onions sold at $2 to $2.25. 
At this time last year State Yellow 
No. 1 sold as high as $11 to $12 per 
100 -lb. bag and Red No. 1 at $9 to $10, 
with the market very strong. 
MARKET DULL ON OLD CARROTS 
Now that new-crop bunched carrots 
from the South are arriving more 
heavily, the trade is turning away from 
old carrots, and market for them is 
dull, except for fancy medium-sized 
bright muck stock. State old crop muck, 
unwashed, best sold at $1.50 to $1.60 on 
March 22, with a few fancy at $1.65. 
Double-headed barrels, ordinary stock, 
sold all the way from $1.75 to $2.50. 
weight of 5,647,544 lbs. of foreign but¬ 
ter have been received at New York. 
Last week two boats arrived from 
Buenos Aires with total cargoes of 
3,600 boxes of salted creamery butter, 
which had an apparent value of 47 to 
48c per lb., duty paid. The Danish 
markets are offering best lots of butter 
for prompt shipment at a cost of 42 %c 
at New York. 
NEW BUTTER STANDARDS 
BROILER DEMAND INCREASING 
The demand for live fat fowls for the 
Jewish Passover holiday was very ac¬ 
tive and premiums were paid for the 
best stock. This special demand will 
be over on Friday, March 30. Old 
roosters were neglected prior to the 
Passover holiday, and there was very 
little demand for last year’s chickens 
except those that were smooth-legged 
and fairly small in size. The demand 
An act recently passed by Congress 
and approved March 4, defines butter 
and provides a standard therefor under 
the Federal Food and Drugs Act, which 
includes the folowing definition: “But- 
shall be understood to mean the food 
product usually known as butter, and 
which is made exclusively from milk or 
cream, or both, with or without com¬ 
mon salt, and with or without addi¬ 
tional coloring not less than 80 per 
cent by weight of milk fat, all toler¬ 
ances having been allowed for.” 
EXPORT BUYING HELPS CHEESE 
Continued export buying of cheese 
has kept up the prices on well-made 
fresh stock. The Wisconsin market was 
Quotations From Eastern Markets 
The following are the prices at which farm products of special interest to 
eastern farmers sold on March 22: 
Eggs, Nearbys (cents per dozeix) ■ 
New Jersey hennery whites uncandled, extras.., 
Other hennery whites, extras. . 
Extra firsts. 
Firsts. 
Gathered, whites, first to extra firsts. 
Lower grades. 
flennery browns, extras. 
Gathered browns and mixed colors, extras...,* 
Pullets No. 1. 
Butter (cents per pound) 
Creamery (salted) high score. 
Extra (92 score). 
State dairy (salted), finest.. 
Good to prime...... 
Hay and Straw, Large Bales (per ton) 
Timothy No. 2..... 
Timothy No. 3... 
Timothy Sample. 
Fancy light clover mixed... 
Alfalfa, second cutting..... 
Oat straw No. 1. 
New York 
Buffalo 
41 @44 
40 @41 
36 @38 
33@34 
34% @35% 
34% @38 
32 @34 
34 
30 @33 
30@31 
27% @28 
50% @51 
54@55 
50 
52@53 
49% 
50@51 
48% @49 
42@48 
U. S. Grades 
Old Grade 
$23@24 
$20@21 
20@22 
12@16 
Phila. 
28 
261/2 
52 
$20@21 
17@18 
25 
30@32 
16@18 
21@22 
'l5@i6 
Live Poultry, Express Lots (cents per lb.) 
Fowls, colored fancy, heavy. 
Fowls, leghorns and poor... 
Chickens, leghorns. 
Roosters. 
29@30 
27 
26 
14@15 
32@33 
28@30 
20@22 
22@23 
32@34 
29@31 
19@20 
Live Stock (cents per pound) 
Calves, good to medium. 
Bulls, common to good.. 
Lambs, common to good. 
Sheep, common to good ewes. 
Hogs, Yorkers. 
13% @14% 
4 @ 4%' 
9% @12% 
3%@ 5% 
9%@ 9% 
8 @13% 
4%@ 6 
14 @15% 
8 @ 9 
9% 
for broilers is steadily increasing. Ex¬ 
press shipments have been light. Be¬ 
cause of increased demand, the market 
was firmer on March 22, with sales of 
colored spring broilers at 70 to 75c, 
and White Leghorns 58 to 67c. 
Long Island spring ducks sold slowly 
last week, and it became necesary to 
reduce the price to 34c, which caused a 
considerably increased demand. In spite 
of the rescinding of the rule of the 
Board of Health restricting the sale of 
live rabbits, very few rabbits were re¬ 
ceived last week, and a strong demand 
for them was expected in the week be¬ 
fore Easter. 
firm last week. State, whole milk flats, 
fresh, average run, were quoted at 
New York March 22 at 25c lb. Held 
flats, average run, ,sold at 28 to 28 %c. 
Considerable cheese was in transit 
last week for Eastern seaboard points 
for shipments to British ports. Stocks 
of old cheese in the East are light. Cold 
storage holdings at New York March 
22 were only 565,041 lbs., compared 
with 791,053 lbs. on that date last year. 
BUTTER CONTINUES FIRM 
The butter market was very firm all 
last week, and prices on March 22 were 
slightly higher than a week previous. 
Quotations on creamery at New York 
March 22 were 13c lb. higher on most 
grades than a year ago. The advance 
in price was in spite of the fact that re¬ 
ceipts last week are about 5,00t) tubs in 
excess of the previous week. The total 
receipts at New York from January 1 
to March 22, 1923, were 663,457 tubs, 
compared "with 614,602 tubs in the 
same period last year. The stocks of 
butter on hand in cold storage are very 
much below those of last year. Im¬ 
provement in industrial conditions gen¬ 
erally seems to have increased con¬ 
sumptive demand for butter. The feel¬ 
ing on the part of the wholesale trade 
is nervous, and the major part of the 
trade are trying to keep their supplies 
cleaned up each day as far as possible. 
Since January 1, 16,955 casks of 
Danish butter, 11,050 boxes of Argen¬ 
tine, 55,889 of New Zealand, a total 
DRESSED CALVES ADVANCE 
Receipts of country dressed calves 
were lighter last week and the extra 
demand on account of the Easter trade 
caused the market to advance. More 
shipments were expected as a result of 
the higher price but quotations are 
likely to drop as soon as the Easter 
demand is supplied. Strictly fancy 
veals are in small proportion of the 
total receipts and the demand for them 
is greater than for any other grade of 
calves. Choice, dressed calves sold 
March 22, at 18 (S) 19c per lb., prime, 
17c, good, 15 @ 16c, medium, 13 @ 14c, 
small, 60 lbs., or common at 10 @ 12c. 
There was a steadily increasing 
demand for dressed hothouse lambs 
and good trading was expected until 
after Easter. Fancy hothouse lambs 
sold at $9 @ $11, and poor, $5 @ $7 
each on March 22. 
TRANSPORTATION IN BAD SHAPE 
Car shortage and congestion of rail¬ 
road traffic promise to be more serious 
this spring than ever. It is quite likely 
that prices of farm products may be 
kept up at consuming centers due to 
inability to move the products from 
country to market. It is also likely that 
\ 
farmers will be greatly handicapped in 
spring operation by delay of fertilizer, 
feeds and other necessities. In our 
judgment, it would pay every farmer 
to anticipate his needs for the next 10 
weeks and order his supplies at once. 
HAY SHIPMENTS STILL HEAVY 
Receipts of hay at New York con¬ 
tinued liberal last -week and the market 
was irregular. Prices were so slow as 
to discourage further heavy shipments 
but there was still considerable hay in 
transit and supplies at the terminals 
were adequate to carry for some time. 
The pendulum of fluctuating prices 
may have swing low enough to cut off 
shipment, so that the man who ships 
at the time of least shipping will get 
his hay here when it swings back again. 
It _ is hard to advise anybody about 
shipping hay to this market as long as 
terminal facilities and methods of hand¬ 
ling are_ such that prices go up and 
down with receipts of comparatively 
few cars. The absence of terminal 
storage facilities is the greatest draw¬ 
back to orderly marketing. 
Very little strictly No. 1 hay was 
received here last week, the bulk of the 
supply grading from No. 2 down with 
a large proportion of' poor hay from 
State _ sections. Sales even on like 
qualities were at widely varying prices 
according to pressure to sell and place 
where hay was unloaded. Some very 
low prices were reported from track 
delivery stations and piers and the aver¬ 
age sales were somewhat lower in 
Brooklyn than at Manhattan points. 
LIGHT TRADING IN FEEDS 
Trading in feeds was dull last week. 
Prices held fairly steady except for oil 
meal, but demand was v/eak. Quota¬ 
tions at Buffalo March 21, carlots Buf¬ 
falo rate basis in 100 lb. sacks, per ton 
were as follows; 
Gluten feed, $46.55; cottonseed meal, 36 
per cent, $47: oil meal. 31 per cent, $40 ; 
standard spring bran, $34.50 ; hard winter 
bran, $35.75 ; choice flour middlings, $36.25; 
white hominy, $32.05. No. 2 yellow corn 
per bushel, 85%c: No. 2 white oats, 53c. 
CASH GRAINS AT NEW YORK 
The following were cash grain prices 
at New York, March 23; 
No. 2 red wheat, $1.45@1.50 ; No. 2 hard 
winter, $1.35%; No. 2 mixed durum, $1.26; 
No. 2 yellow corn, 93%c; No. 2 mixed corn, 
93c; No. 2 white oats, 56%c; rye, 94%c; 
barley, 81@82c; buckwheat, $1.90@2.10. At 
Chicago; No. 2 yellow corn, 75@75%c; No. 
2 white oats, 46%@47c. 
The farmer who ships rotten or im¬ 
perfect vegetables has no right to be- 
mean the commission agent at the other 
end of the line because he could not 
dispose of them profitably. 
