Oranges from Florida also may have a slightly marked exterior. The orange's delicious taste is not affected by wind-scarring. When shopping for fresh oranges, remember to look for an orange that's firm and heavy, with no soft spots. Official USDA inspectors have sampled the season's fruit one last time. The oranges are ripe and ready for picking.
Pickers head for the groves with canvas picking bags slung over their shoulders.
From high on their ladders, they pick hard and fast, taking care not to bruise or scratch the fruit. A good picker may pick more than 7,000 pounds of fruit in a day. Pickers are paid by the amount of fruit they pick, depending on the type of fruit involved. When a picker's bag is full, he empties it from the bottom, pouring the fruit into a big pallet box that can hold 900 pounds of fruit. Oranges that are to be processed for juice go into smaller tubs.