As to pasturing the orchard, some think it pays; others that it does no harm; others still—and they are many—condemn it. The larger proportion of those who pasture confine the stock to calves, colts, and pigs. Some would allow only poultry in the orchard, and the poultry must not roost in the trees. This latter point is an excellent one.
We find we have plenty of insects; this is natural. Insects settle in a country that provides proper food for them and their larva. As apple trees are planted in new localities the insects that delight in apple-tree wood, apple-tree roots, apple-tree foliage and apple-tree fruits immigrate, grow, and multiply.
Spraying or using some preventive or destroyer has become necessary, and the man who believes it unnecessary and intends to trust to nature or providence or God will find no truer saying than "God helps those who help themselves." Sit down calmly and watch the worms eat your trees, trust to the woodpecker and the sparrows, and you will in time buy apples from your more active, thoroughgoing neighbor, or go without.
Methods of picking do not vary much, yet all agree that it should be done carefully. If shaken from the tree, poured out carelessly, or jolted about in a lumber wagon, it simply increases the culls and decreases the cash returns.
Sorting is done in various ways (a sorting table or device is explained elsewhere), but a majority seem to make three classes: First class, the unblemished best of each variety; culls, which are the unmarketable, specked, bruised and gnarled fruit; second class, which are between the other two, and really valuable for immediate use. In some cases the "second best" have been put in cold storage, and they sold well after the usual fall glut.
Packing: While there are many who handle in a small way in boxes—and the time is near when all fancy apples will be marketed in boxes—yet all the larger growers use barrels, and it is encouraging to find they use full twelve-peck barrels. The eleven-peck barrels should be boycotted out of existence.
Marketing: In our large apple-growing districts the crop is generally wholesaled, either in the orchard or subject to delivery at the railroad, generally in barrels. In the western half of the state the apples are largely taken in bulk, in wagons, hauled farther west and south, and sold at a good profit to the wagoner. Thousands of wagon-loads are thus disposed of every year. The same wagons often appear in the same neighborhood year after year, to the mutual advantage of all. Shipping to distant markets by the growers, especially when consigned, has been generally unsatisfactory. I need not give reasons; my own experience along similar lines makes me "hot under the hat" when I think over it.
Drying is not practiced to the extent that it ought to be. It seems almost a sin to allow so many thousands of bushels of apples to rot on the ground every year simply because the owner lacks faith in his ability to turn them into a product that will keep while he looks up a market. Dried apples are in demand—hundreds of tons of them—and Kansas dried apples stand as good chances to bring as remunerative prices to the manufacturer as those from other states. If the work is economically done a profit is sure. Storing for winter is described elsewhere.
Cold storage, cave storage, and cellar storage: All know that, after the perishable and inferior apples are gone, good winter apples bring sure and large returns. How best to preserve them is a vital question. The art of keeping apples by the artificial cold-storage process is yet imperfect and unsatisfactory, and the losses have been so great that, unless the owner of the plant will take part of the risk, at least to the extent of his fee, he will find the average grower standing back. To lose your apples, and then pay fifty cents per barrel to the man whose ignorance or carelessness may have caused the loss, is a burden too heavy to be borne. The hillside cave is described elsewhere, and the orchardist who has such a cave well built, and gives it careful attention, will save a large portion of the fee, and have his apples always under his own supervision, besides saving in hauling, and perhaps railroad freight to and from a distant cold-storage plant. House cellars, small caves and buried heaps each and all have their advocates, mostly for family use or among the small growers.
It seems to be determined that the Winesap is the better keeper, followed closely by the Missouri Pippin and Ben Davis. Of less marketable varieties, Rawle's Janet and Rambo seem to keep best. The per cent. of loss, excepting in a few cases, does not seem great considering the (usually) greatly increased value of the sound apples.