The record-union., 1898-03-19
ESSAY ON PlCKLIHG OLIVES.
READ BY CHARLES E. MACK AT
THE FARMERS, INSTITUTE.
Record OF an Extended Series OF
Experiments With the Results
Obtained.

E. Mack of the Union House on Pick
| ling Olives" at the Farmers Institute at
Florin yesterday:
Locally there is considerable interest
I taken in olive culture. 1t is true no large
area is planted to the tree referred TO-
still a few trees can be found in nearly
every yard, occupying the same place
in the economy of the household held Sc
] long undiSputed by the time-honofeu
! hen. 1t is a very noticeable fact thar
| the fruit of the olive tree is no longer
allowed to drop on the ground, there u
| decay, but on the other hand every olive
! is saved and picked for future use. In
some instances people of this commun-
ity have gone miles to even single trees
| in order to secure enough for thelI
wants. The people here have learned
to appreciate sound ripe picked olives
in a way quite astonishing. Only one OF
| two orchards have been started on a
commercial scale.
That the tree will flourish and do eX-
ceedingly well here is no longer con-
| jecture-the gratifying conclusion can
be seen in my own orchard three miles
from here. 1t would not surprise me
some day to see many acres of them on
/
ening that way now from the inquiries
made concerning my experience with
the tree An olive crop can be disposed
of in various ways 1t is possible to
dry it; it can be made into oil, and
lastly it can be converted into pickles.
The market is too circumscribed for the
dried product. The cheap foreign adul-
terated oils have paralyzed the market
FrNra C11f oil hi n
ways pure. Strictly pure, genuine for
| eign olive oil with the aroma OF the
tree was formerly made out of hog
| lard, but nowadays it is madS out OF
anything greasy.
Passing on to the third means of dis
posal for an olive crop and the one in
which we are all more or less interested
1 shall detain you as briefly as possible
AT this point, before having perpetrated
this paper on you, and while presumably
| you have the best of brotherly love for
me and your minds are relentiye, wish
to impress it upon you that l am not
an adept olive picker. l do not want
you to think / am trying to pose as an
expert in this line for / am not. Please
dismiss as fallacy any such suspicion
/ have picked a few olives yearly foi
several years. This year picked more
than ever before. Some of them turned
out first-class, others second-class and
/ there were still others that were so mis-
! e1ably poor that conScientiOusly l could
not classify~them at all-turned them
in fact by the lye treatment into an in
! ferior grade of soap. l purposely
brought around the above results i'll
| order to learn to some extent the out
| come of several experiments. l used
the process recommended by the State
! University for the base and deviated
above and below it for other results.
! kept data and this paper is simply re-
! capitulation of my notes. The olives
experimental with were Mission, Man
| zanillo, Rubra, Pendulina, Uvaria and
| Columella. The objects to be attained
! in treating olives are, first, to remove
| the bitterness, and second, to preserve
them so that they will remain sound and
good for even years. The picking pro-
| cesses, as given gratuitously by various
growers and others, seem easy and SIM
pie, but if you will experiment in prac-
tical way you will find number of COM
plex and discouraging circumstances
| before you are through with any OF
them. That every man can convert his
olives into first-class pickles that Will
keep for one year sound and good / very
much doubt. Nearly any one can pickle
olives so they are good and palataDle
and do very we'll for his family, which
will blindly overlook little short com
ings because Papa put them up
believe it is within the scope of any
ordinary mans ability, provided he is
studious, observing and superlatlVely
painstaking after a year or so of expert
ence, without something unforeseen de-
velops to pickle olives so that the con-
sumer thereof will say they are good
and without the papa" sympathy.
! Picking olives requires patience 'ano
| observation, and the pickler should be
a man of nice enough discrimination
| and Judgment to deviate from the
standard methods in order to suit any
peculiar condition which might turn up
If he persists in following closely some
published process, no matter from
whom or however good, he will work al
a disadvantage, for be it remembered
some varieties contain more bitterness
than others, and even the same var1e-
/ ties will vary in the same orchard the
same year When the ripe picked Cal
| ifornia olive is properly treated 1T has
no competitor. This necessitates eau
tion and careful handling and grading
The first act in successful picking
| (and which I will demonstrate later on
| is properly picking the olives from the
tree The fruit must not be beaten OF
knocked or raked off, but it must be
carefully picked by hand and tenderly
handled thereafter as long as it re-
mains in the possession of the picker
! Some of the best picklers pick THEN
/ olives in pals in which there is some
wa13r to break their fall. and / think
while it may not be very convenient
/ the idea is an excellent one. / expert
mented on this point, and l am pre-
pared to say it is imperative that olives
must not be bruised by a fall or press
ure l took an empty barrel and lei
olives drop into it from the top in just
! the manner one would use if he were
| in the orchard 1 then let an equa
number Gwo gallons) drop about eight
feet into the barrel / also put SONS
water into the barrel, and put in olives
as described in the first experiment
| I then placed the different lots in differ
ent crooks, and in warm temperature
| favorable to the production of blue
moult, and the result was that in only
| a few days patches of mould could be
t seen all over the surface of the water
! containing the olives which had the
/ eight-foot fall, also a mucilaginous sub
| stance around the edges of the crock
The olives that had been simply rolled
| into the empty barrel in a few days
| longer produced an abundant crop OF
mould, and the result was that in only
/ fall broken by the water in the barrel
remained entirely free from mould
| Many soft olives could be found among