The Waikato Times AND THAMES VALLEY GAZETTE. SATURDAY, FEB. 36, 1887.

Waikato Times, Volume XXVIII, Issue 2283, 26 February 1887, Page 2

The Waikato Times AND THAMES VALLEY GAZETTE.

SATURDAY, FEB. 36, 1887.

Equal and exact justice to all men, Of whatsoever state ot persuasion, religious or political.

♦ Fruit-growing now forms, more or less, one of the occupations of the Waikato settler, and the abundance of the apple crop (which may be expected to increase yearly in an increasing ratio as the trees grow older and planting is continued) forces upon us the necessity of. finding a market for this kind of produce. There are, we think it will be found, three outlets on which we may safely depend for a market for our fruit beyond the ordinary consumption. These are—the manufacture of cider, the drying or evaporation of apples and pears, and the exportation of the choicer descriptions of cooking and dessert apples, especially the latter, to the Home market. In none of these cases will the mountain come to Mahomet. We must move in the matter ourselves if we would succeed. Individual and associated effort may do much, however, and we write in the hope of stimulating to such effort. A cider-mill has been established in Waikato, and we hear of one orchardist having sold his apples (the codlin moth has largely infected his trees) at 5s per cwt. to the mill, in preference to sending them to Auckland and receiving sevenpence per case net returns, as he has done this season. Others will doubtless follow his example. For general information we may state that a yield of gallons of cider is possible from a weighed bushel of apples, but the average, and much depends on the mill, is less. If, however, we are to make cider-growing an industry, we must lay ourselves out to produce the proper kinds of apples for cider-making. We need not imagine that we can turn out cider of a quality that will command the market from the present ordinary produce of our orchards. We need not, however, be long iu bringing such trees into full bearing. Scions of the best cider-making apples can easily be procured, the Golden Har

vey, the Bittersweet, and a score of others. Experience has shown every orcharclist that he has more or less of worthless trees, either producing inferior fruit, or those of non-keeping varieties, the produce of which he is obliged to rush into an early market at once or feed to his pigs. These could be cut back and grafted with scions from the best cider apple trees, and would grow rapidly and bear at once. For good cider there is an unlimited demand ; for those inferior and non-keeping apples, a week's ripening of the fruit in February gluts the market.

Our next outlet, as we have said, may be looked for in the manufacture of dried or evaporated fruit. This industry is carried on with success all over the United States of America, in almost; every homestead, and does not depend upon a local market and consumption. The apparatus chiefly in use in America, is the Zimmerman, which claims that it simply evaporates the moisture, leaving in the dried apple the full flavour and substance, only needing to be soaked to assume its original form aud appearance. The Zimmerman Dryer, which we believe can be procured from Auckland agents, is made in different sizes No. 1, 2 and 3, with bleacher attachments complete, prices 50 dollars, 65 dollars, and 220 dollars respectively. No 3is only required on a large scale of business, and will treat 15 to 20 bushels of apples pier.day. No. 2 is that chiefly used. It is 24 inches deep by 26 inches in width, and stands 5£ feet high having a substantial furnace for wood or coal; has 12 galvanised wire trays 22 x 22 inches, giving over 40 square feet of drying surface, and has a capicity for apples of sto 7 bushels per diem. It has also baking and roasting attachments for ordinary kitchen use. No. 1 machine has a capacity for apples of from 3 to 5 bushels per day,' is 24 x 26 inches, standing 4ft. high. These machines are readily portable, weighing 1501bs. 2201b5, and 6001bs respectively, and may -be used out of doors, or inside where they can be connected with a chimney. The Zimmerman completely obviates all the tedious work and the difficulties that attend drying the fruit in the sun in the open air. By allowing the drying to go on in wet weather it prevents the great loss attendant upon the old method, while the exclusion of light (which discolours open air dried fruit) of flies and dust joined to the rapidity with which the drying is done remove the other obstacles to the best results. " This dryer turns out a product so superior both in appearance and cleanliness," says the American Agriculturist, in noticing the machine, "as to astonish those who have never seen fruit properly dried, and s > unlike the common sun dried fruit as to warrant the different name that the Zimmerman Company have given to the product of their machines, i.e., "evaporated fruit." A bushel of apples weighing SOlbs will yield 6|lbs of evaporated fruit, and such fruit sells in the States at from 10 to 15 cents per lb. One bushel of pared peaches, weighing 45lbs, will yield s£lbs of evaporated fruit; and a bushel of whole peaches, weighing 52lbs, will yield On a No. 2 dryer 35lbs of evaporated fruit may be put through in 24 hours. Why, we ask, should the American settler, with use of these machines, turn his apples to so profitable an account, while the New Zealander, for want of the appliances, is content to feed his surplus crop of apples to the pigs ?

But there is another, and, we believe, the chief outlet for our apples to be found in the London and Home markets; nay, in the markets of all European capitals, where the rich and luxurious are congregated. The apple crop becomes exhausted, or the stock has diminished to a mere nothing in relation to the demand, by the month, of April at Home, just the time when we can commence to furnish a steady supply of apples into the English market. The fruitgrowers in the Middle Island, are, we understand, awakening to this fact, and are planting largely the earlier ripening varieties of apples, so as to be able to supply the Home market, when the Home stock of apples begins to slacken off, even earlier than April. AVhether th«y are wise in too largely attending to the matter of time, and in going in for the earliest ripening varieties, is, we believe, a matter of question. The Home market must be unstocked with apples from March to early autumn, wlien its own apple harvest commences, £ind as we must look for high prices at Home to make this trade profitable to the exporter —at any rate at first, till freight and other matters regulate themselves to moderate proportions —the chief matter to be studied should be, we believe, to send Home first-class dessert fruit, which will find purchasers among the wealthier classes at abnormal prices—such apples as the Eipston pippin, the Cox's orange pippin, and others. That the Home market will prove the best outlet for our choicest dessert and culinary apples and pears we fully believe. It must be remembered that these colonies will have the monopoly of supply, for they are the only apple - growing countries south of the line, and the season in other parts of Europe and in the United States of America is so much the same that no supply can be obtained from those countries. Nay, our market would be practically unlimited, for other European countries would as readily receive our apples at this season as would England.

Whether, then, we look to any one or to all three of these outlets for our apple crop we must bear in mind that our orchard planting must be undertaken with a certain defined object in view, and not, as has bithertq been too generally the case,

on the principle in planting that a tree is a tree, of whatever kind. Neither the soil nor the tree can provide its own brains ; these must be provided by the orchardist.