The Pears of New York. U. P. Hedrick
HARVESTING AND MARKETING
Fruit-growing is made up of several quite distinct phases of activity; as, propagation, culture, pruning, pests, harvesting, and marketing. Treated in detail, each of these several operations constitutes matters quite sufficient for separate treatises. In a manual such as this only outlines of present practices are in place. Perhaps of all deciduous fruits the pear needs as particular attention in the various operations which conduct it from the orchard to the table as any other, if, indeed, it is not the most difficult of hardy fruits to handle after it leaves the orchard. The several operations that should be treated in a discussion of handling the pear crop, no matter how brief, are picking, grading, packing, storing, shipping, and marketing.
The time of picking is most important in handling pears. Pears are picked, especially for the markets, long before they are ready to eat out of hand. So harvested, almost without exception, all pears acquire higher quality than when they ripen on the tree. Moreover, when the necessary percentage of sugars and solids has developed to give full flavor the pears are too easily bruised to be shipped. Just how green pears can be harvested and afterward have the rich shades of red and yellow and the delectable flavor of ripe pears develop seems not yet to have been determined.[22] No doubt the stages of development differ somewhat with the variety. In New York, the generally accepted rule is to pick when the stem parts readily from the branch if the fruit is lifted. Some wait until there is a perceptible yellowing of the maturer fruits; others until full-grown, wormy specimens are ripe; still others until the seeds begin to change color. But on the Pacific slope and for the cannery in this State, pears are picked when much greener than in any of the conditions named and yet seem to ripen well. As a matter of economy, the fruits should be left until they attain nearly or quite full size.
The directions just given apply more particularly to the main-crop pears and early and fall sorts. Winter pears in this State should be left on the trees until in danger from freezing. Even so, the season is too short for some choice winter sorts. No matter what the season, pears should be shipped before they reach edible condition. A few of the winter pears, suitable only for culinary purposes, never soften, and change color little or not at all.
Picking pears is not the delicate business that picking the stone-fruits is, but yet must be done with considerable care as a bruise provides a place for subsequent decay. Few picking appliances are needed, but these should be carefully chosen to insure speed and careful handling of the fruit. A full complement of ladders is necessary, and the picking receptacle, either bag, basket, or bucket, should be chosen to fulfill most conveniently its purpose and yet not be a source of danger to the fruit. From the picking receptacle, the pears go to the crate or barrel for carriage to the packing-house; for, unless the fruit is going to the cannery, pears should be graded and packed in the packing-house.
Grading pears is a more difficult operation than grading apples, as mechanical graders have proved of little use, and the work must be done by hand. Only good fruit is worth grading. It follows, that the higher the price and the more special the market, the more carefully should the pears be picked and graded. Pears are usually graded in New York into firsts, seconds, and culls. The State has no law governing the grading and packing of pears as it has of apples and peaches, so that pear-growers must establish their own grades. By common consent of growers and dealers, Grade I consists of pears of one variety, full sized, well formed, free from dirt, skin-breaks, worms, scale, scab or other damage caused by insect or disease, hail pecks, or mechanical injuries. Grade II differs from Grade I only in that the pears may not be of full size nor perfect in form. A leeway of five to ten per cent is allowed for variation incident to grading and handling. Culls are pears which do not meet the requirements of the foregoing grades.
In putting up grades every effort is made to keep the fruit in a package uniform in size. At the beginning of the season the sizes are gauged by putting the pears through rings of the diameter desired. But packers soon become expert in sizing, and with a little practice perform the work quickly and accurately without rings. Of the larger pears, such as Bartlett, Clapp Favorite, Beurré Bosc, and Beurré d’Anjou, fruits are hardly worth putting in a good package that do not measure two and one-fourth inches through the shorter axis.
Grading and sizing pears are greatly neglected, and most of the crop goes to the market in this State wretchedly packed, for which reason maximum prices are seldom received. The industry can never compete successfully with western pear-growing until higher standards are adopted in putting the New York crop on the market.
In common with grading and sizing, packages are neglected in marketing New York pears. Some growers pack in bushel baskets; a few send the crop to market in half-bushel baskets; a large size of the Climax basket is occasionally seen in the markets filled with summer pears or small Seckels; a keg holding about a bushel or more is less used; a pear barrel holding a peck less than an apple barrel was formerly more used than now; Kieffer is often sent to the market in apple barrels. A very few New York growers ship in boxes, but these are few indeed. In all excepting the boxes, the pears, having been graded, are carefully put in the packages, sometimes in layers and sometimes hit or miss, but the package is always faced. Good grades are usually labeled, though the same attention is not given to labeling pears that is given in putting up apples. Truth is, the packing of pears in New York is a decade or two behind the packing of apples.
The commercial pear-grower now stores his pears in cold storage if he keeps them any length of time after harvesting. A few varieties, of which Beurré Bosc is most notable, do not keep well in cold storage, but most of the mainstays in the pear industry keep fairly well in artificial cold. There is, however, much to be learned about the commercial storage of pears. There seems to be little information that can be relied upon as to how low the temperature should go; how humid the atmosphere should be; how long the pears can be kept in good condition; and how different varieties behave under these several conditions.
Perhaps a word should be said as to how the pear can be ripened best in the home. After harvesting, the pears should be placed in a cool sweet-smelling fruit-room in shallow boxes or spread upon shelves to acquire in time full flavor and color. Most pears part with their moisture readily, and the pear-room must not be open to draughts which usually cause the fruits to become hard and leathery or to shrivel. If the pears are to be kept long, wrapping in paper helps to prevent shriveling. Nearly all pears ripen perfectly in cool or cold storage, but a few late winter sorts ripen better if brought into a temperature of 60° or 70° for two or three weeks before their season.
A large part of New York’s pear crop is canned in commercial canneries. Canners usually pay high prices, and the crop, when sold to them, need not be so carefully picked, packed, and otherwise handled. It is a mistake to assume that pears for the cannery can be shaken from the tree or handled roughly otherwise. Neither do the canners want the poor grades, after the good pears have been sent to the market. Large sizes are usually preferred, and the fruits must be well formed, free from serious insect, fungous, or mechanical injuries, and at a particular stage of maturity which the canner specifies. The profits in selling to canners are usually more certain, and are often quite as great as in selling on the markets. The cannery is a splendid safety valve to the pear industry in this State. Pears are not dried commercially in New York as they are in California, although it would seem that here in the center of the apple-drying industry of the world pears might also be dried with profit.
Most of the pear crop of this region is now sold to local buyers or on consignment to city dealers. Co-operative methods are just beginning and promise much. There are several reasons why the pear, even more than the apple, which is more and more going to the markets through co-operative associations, should be handled by organizations of growers. Thus, an association could load a car quickly, which few individual growers can do; pears are not now, but would be, graded and packed under one standard; more favorable transportation rates would be secured; and, most important of all, the pear crop would be distributed to the great markets of the country without the disastrous competition that attends individual marketing. If the pear industry is to grow in the State, pears must be largely marketed through the central packing