The Lee County journal. (Leesburg, Ga.) 1904-19??, 1909-04-30

seeing something Of the work Of the
strawberry and apple grower. take
an instance-one OF number OF SIM
liar character--in which strawberries
covered a quarter Of the area Of q
five-acre holding. On this compare
lively small plot crop was grown
which realized $50 in the market, the
work being practically all performed
by the holder and his wife. These
persons, like their naighbors, had
originally been engaged in mechan-
ical work, and simply acquired their
knowledge of fruit culture, like the
strawberry growers of Botley, from
those who had picked it up before
them. In another case grower own
ing a larger area of land was con-
fining himself to potatoes on his
arabic and apples and plums on his
planted land. The plantation, five or
six acres in extent, is five years old,
and is being supplemented by an
other, for which young trees have
been produced on the property; and
thus it is that the beginner, COM
PEELED at first to buy his trees from
the nurseryman, is able to extend his
acreage by growing them for himself,
avoiding a cost which is always a seri-
Gus item. Just as the strawberry
grower referred to by doing his own
work grows the best fruit and keeps
it clean with straw, seeking to obtain
early and late crops, either of which
realize better prices than the main
crop, so does the apple grower, by
systematic and continuous expert
mentor fruit culture is all expert
ment-seek to ascertain which vari-
cites suit his soil and climate best,
and how to produce large and GER
tain crop by careful pruning and by
spraying in spring to prevent de-
struction by parasitic life.
The advantage of the bush tree is
that the branches, like the fruit, are
within reach of the hands, so, that
pruning is rendered easy, the tree
kept open, and the fruit hand picked,
and thus, too, the best fruit can be
picked when it is fittest for the mar
ket, carefully sorted and packed, and
sold to realize the highest price. The
grower in question fully realizes all
this. Just as eggs are now handled
separately, sorted into sizes and col
ors, and, it is feared, in TOO many
cases, sold as new laid, when they
have crossed the sea, so will the apple
grower of the future pay attention to
every individual fruit, that it may be
presented in boxes or baskets to the
buyer in its most attractive condi-
tion. The return of the strawberry
grower is much more rapid than that
of the apple grower who plants his
own land, but it cannot be doubted,
bearing in mind the results c. the last
season, that, next to the very earliest
fruit, late fruit-that available up to
August 10, for examples the most
profitable. On many heavy soils
black currants, If free from disease,
are profitable; on many medium soils
gooseberries pay we'll, and in one case
I walked through plantation Of
some twenty acres in area which the
at e13 an acre, for others to pick and
to market, which, believe, they did
with great advantage to themselves.
The cost to the owner of the planta-
ton was chiefly confined to hoeing,
occasional manuring, and the replac-
ing of dead bushes. To sell we'll,
fruit should be attractive in color as
in flavor, which it chiefly owes to the
sugars and acids, chiefly malic and
.citric, which it contains.
AS to the value of fruit as food,
we have only to consult reliable data
showing of what it is composed. For
instance, the fuel value Of a pound
OF bananas or grapes is three. times
as large as that of pound Of straw
berries, and much larger than in the
case OF the apple, the fig or the cur
rant, all of which are much superior
to the orange or the pear, the value
of which in this respect is very low
but little, indeed, above that of the
watermelon. The water contents of
fresh fruits vary, for example, from
seventy-flve in the banana to ninety
two in the watermelon. Few fruits
contain more than one and one-half
per cent. of proteine, which is poor in
the apple and the peach, while, the
sugar and similar carbohydrates are
richest in the banana among fruits
known in this country, the pear, the
cherry, the grape and the apple, the
last named containing some thirteen
per cent, while the banana contains
rwenty-one per cent.
A change takes place in the rela-
tive proportions Of feeding matter
and water wher fruit is dried. Here