western States for the growers to sell the crop on the trees. This practice has rapidly gained ground in Massachusetts. The buyer comes to the orchard, and either pays a lump sum for the entire crop, or else pays a stipulated price per barrel. In the latter case the price is, say, $1.50 for the best grade and $1 for the second grade, the grading being done by the buyer. This method has considerable advantages for the men who are not in close touch with apple markets, or who are not experienced in grading and packing fruit. It relieves the grower immediately of the two great responsibilities— grading and selling.

(3) On Commission. - One of the best recognized methods of selling is that of shipping the fruit on commission. When the barrels or boxes are ready, they are put in the hands of commission men, usually in one of the large city markets. The commission man sells them for what he can get, and returns the amount to the grower minus the commission and any charges for freight, cartage, storage, etc. There are many disadvantages to this system, and much fault has been found with it; but, on the whole, it is the best method for a large number of growers. If a reliable commission house is selected, and if the shipper is careful and honest on his side of the transaction, good results may be expected. Most of the cursing against commission men comes from shippers who have tried to cheat them.

(4) On Joint Account. This is a new method of selling, and not often adopted. According to this method, the grower turns over his fruit to the seller at picking time, receiving a stipulated amount in cash down. This is considerably less than the value of the fruit, say $1 a barrel. The fruit is then held by the seller, and disposed of at his option. At the close of the season, when the fruit is all sold, the shipper and seller have a final settlement. From the gross amounts of the sales there is deducted first the advance payment made to the shipper; then the storage, freight and other charges are subtracted; the balance is finally divided equally between the apple grower and the apple seller. In every instance which has come to our notice this method has worked very well.

THE CURRENT CROP.

It may be proper to remark that, though 1904 is scheduled as "the apple year" with us, the crop now promises to be moderate. The most reliable reports that we have seen say that it will be less than last year. This is rather a safe way of estimating, for the markets handled more apples from the crop of 1903 than ever before in the history of American apple-growing. Prices offered by buyers this fall will probably be about the same as in the fall of 1903. Though growers cannot generally expect to get better prices than a year ago, they should not be frightened into selling for less merely because this is called "the apple year" in Massachusetts.

BREEDS FOR THE FARM AND FARMERS AS POULTRY BREEDERS.

BY JOHN H. ROBINSON, EDITOR "FARM-POULTRY," BOSTON, MASS.

When I was a boy in Illinois, thoroughbred fowls were rare, and even less frequently found on farms than elsewhere. But there was one thing about the farm flocks in those days that I often think of with regret, that in the improvement of poultry stocks that feature has been lost; i.e. the fowls in each flock and the flocks throughout each community were, in general, very much alike.

To be sure, there was not the uniformity one finds to-day in a lot of selected specimens from a stock of well-bred birds. The best specimens were not to be compared with the finest developed specimens of to-day, for either color, shape or size. Yet I am inclined to think that, aside from the matter of color, the average farm flock of those days was more uniform than even the average fancier's flock of to-day, and there are some breeds now popular for which I would not except color, either. Observe that I do not claim that the flocks of the old days were as good as those of to-day, only that they were more uniform.

It is to be regretted that in the improving of flocks, which has followed the introduction of new breeds, uniformity in flocks and of the flocks in the same section have so seldom been retained. There have been so many new and improved breeds to select from, that as soon as people began to go outside of their own immediate neighborhood to get new blood, and to try to introduce blood that would improve their flock, those who had before used the same kind of stock began to use some very different stocks; and, as they still continued exchanging "roosters" and eggs with their neighbors, the result was that the flocks often became fear

fully and wonderfully mixed. The poultry stocks of the country, considered as a whole, continue so. There are

here and there farming localities where nearly all farmers keep the same kind of fowls, and in some sections flocks of certain breeds are much more numerous than elsewhere; but there is not anywhere such greater uniformity and better general excellence as might reasonably be expected after two-thirds of a century of improvement.

That this last statement is not in accordance with general ideas I am well aware. Any one who will consider the lack of uniformity in the poultry found in the ordinary farm flock, as well as in the ordinary town flock, and who will observe the small proportion of only fair-sized fowls, must admit that there are grounds for it. We need not, however, depend merely on observation. Here is an illustration. A few years ago I had a lot of Light Brahma hens I wanted to sell in a bunch, and at once, in order to get them out of the way. I could not sell them to any of the local buyers, because they were too large for their trade; so I asked a buyer in a section the other side of Boston, where Brahmas were bred more than any other fowl, if he could use them. He agreed to take them, and turned the deal over to a Somerville buyer, who sometimes made trips to my town. The lot of hens sold weighed at this time only a little over seven pounds apiece, average live weight. They had been laying heavily for between six and seven months, and were not in good condition. Four months before they were sold they would have averaged better than nine pounds, many of the hens weighing when in good condition ten to ten and a half pounds. When the man who came for them was weighing them, he remarked that they were the heaviest and largest hens he had had for a couple of years.

Talking about weights of poultry, one thing led to another, until finally he asked: "What do you suppose is the average weight of the fowls we buy?" I guessed, "About five pounds." "Well," said he, "the most of the hens we get weigh three to three and a half pounds. Hens that weigh four to five pounds we call large hens, and we get very few lots that will average four pounds.”

Since then I have taken some pains to learn from other buyers and to see for myself as I went about among poultry keepers-whether his statements were correct; and I have to conclude that they were, and that the average fowl of to-day is but a slight improvement over the best ordinary fowls of sixty or seventy years ago. Why is it? I think the answer is, there has not been the improvement of poultry generally that there ought to be, because the farmer is so seldom a poultry breeder.

That does not indicate that farmers as a class are different from other poultry keepers. The ordinary poultry keeper, even the ordinary fancier, is not, strictly speaking, a breeder. But, inasmuch as the farmers produce by far the greater part of the country's supply of poultry and eggs (some authorities say nine-tenths of it), what farmers generally do or fail to do with regard to poultry is of vastly more importance than what the rest of the poultry keepers do or neglect to do; for, if all the other poultry keepers by general consent should adopt a course which would greatly improve their stocks of fowls, the effect on the whole market product would be small, as compared with the results if half or even a third of the farmers were to pursue the same

course.

Most people who raise poultry are just poultry growers. They hatch the eggs of such stock as they happen to have. They keep on, year after year, reproducing fowls, without any definite ideas as to the particular points of excellence which it would be desirable to establish in their stock. They interest themselves little if at all in the principles of breeding; they follow no definite system. If they use some pure-bred stock, they give no special attention to preserving its characteristics. Oftener, indeed, such special attention as they give it is in the line of getting rid of whatever fixed character their fowls possess. The average poultry keeper has a perfect mania for crossing breeds, and nearly always he makes crosses without definite ideas about what he is likely to get, or what he wants to get. Then, not finding the product pleasing, he crosses again and again, until, becoming disgusted with his chickens, he either