The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1891-07-15
MOST FRUITS SCARCE.
Plenty of watermelons but Few G.

! Plenty of Watermelons but Few Can
taloupes-M Money in small Fruits.
! The commission men have bad q hEht
season this year in the handling of fruits
Almost all the fruit crops were failure.
The cautaloupe, which is e very popular
fruit and also a profitable crop to the
grower, was a complete failure, both As tc
quantity and quality. The crop was very
small, and such fruit IS was produced yss
watery aud iusipid, and entirely lacking in
that flavor which gives It popularity.
4 leading fruit dealer said there had not
been a decent cantaloupe on the market this
year. Nevertheless, such IS were put upon
the market brought high prices, the best
fruit retail nG at 25 cents apiece.
There was big crop Of hackle5erries
and blackberrles, which were retailed by
the hucksters who gathered them In the
country They sold st 10 cents quart and
upward. There were no blackherries and
huckleberries shipped from Savannah. as
these fruits do not pass through the hands
Of the commission men at all, being han
died entirely by the hucksters.
A MORNING News reporter who dropped
iato the store Of one Of the largest fruit
commission dealers yesterday, found several
crstes Of peaches and grapes ON hand. Some
Of the peaches were very fine, being Of the
large yellow variety, and others we're quite
inferior, being almost green.
How about the peach crop; has it i'm
proved a9y OF later was asked OF the fruit
dealer.
NO e" was the reply. "the whole peach
crop has been very light The fruit, though
has been Of pretty fair quality. and has
brought high prices. The man with peaeh
orchard that bore anything like 8 crop this
year has made q small fortune The man
who ships such trash IS that pointing to
the green peaches, has made good deal Of
money. Peaches are selling at about 80
cents a basketo or e2 50 q crate Of six baskets.
About all OF our peaches have come from
Vineyard and Marshallvills this year. Ten
nile and other points, which were known as
peaoh-growing localities were not in It this
year
Where do the grapes come fromp
"Some are from Florida, some from Mar
shallville, Ga, and some from Chatham
county. They are all the Ca,awba grape.
The Chatham county grape is the very test
Of them ALL I'll state, and sells well. 1t has
O sweeter taste and is not quite so acid as
the others. These came from Bloomingdale.
They are selling at 81 Is to 90 box or
carrier, which contain six baskets. They
retail at the fruit stands at from Is to 20
cents pound"
Pretty good, so far as l can hear.
don't think there will be any scarcity of
grapes"
"Do you do any business In handling the
smaller fruits and berries"
"None at all. l don't think / have
handled more than one or two crates of
Georgia raspberries in the ten years I
have been in the business here. There
are no raspberries raised for sale nor are
there any cultivated blackberries in this
part Of the country. There are some straw
berries raised here. but not enough to sup
ply the homo market. There would be good
money in raising raspberries, stra " berries,
goossberries and currants for this market
and for shipment. They grow we'll here
and would find a ready market, I don't
know that it would pay to cultivate the
blackberry here, as there are such
quantities Of the wild blackberry. There
is great deal of money in raising these
small fruits and berries. Thousands of dol
lars worth of blackberries alone are mar
keted in the mountain country of Pennsyl-
vanis every year. Some of the country
stores in the mountain districts depend
almost entirely upon the blackberry crop
1t might be worth the while of the truck
farmers to devote few of their acres to
the growing Of these berries. There might
be much more money IN it than in the
0rOtpinor NJ hn Ia rArar truok NrrNm