IMPORTANT TO FRUIT GROWERS.

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume XXX, Issue 10058, 27 July 1895, Page 1 (Supplement)

IMPORTANT TO FRUIT GROWERS.

Some months ago we (Argus) published a sammary of a report by Mr James M. Sinclair, who reoeDtly visited Amerioa on bohalf of the Government and tbe agricultural societies, on Dr Perkins's method of preserving frnit by means of sterilised.'air. Sinoe hla return to Melbourne, Mr Sinolair haa received private letters and nowspapor outtioga from California giving an account of a moat successful trial of tho process, the principle of which is very simple. It is thus described by the Sa,n Francisco Chronicle. ■— "Attached to the locomotive is an air compressor, in which the pressure o£ air reaohes over BMb. to the. square v>oh. Atr compressed to

suoh an extent becomes heated to M<& • degree that the (terminal life ; it. oontains is destroyed. The itanlUM air is. creased into a receiver, whew It U cooled" and then forced into an air-tight oar, in which the fruit is placed. The germ.laden air ia in turn forced out Of the cir, and the fruit Is carried to Its destination to perfeotly pure »ir. Monld and other matter of a fungui nature originateHn the atmosphere and settles upon fruit, where it spreads and toon acts np decomposition; where only, . pure air reaches the fruit the process of decomposition i» arrested for a. long time. By Dr Perkins's ■ppuattu pan oold air in kept in constant circulation through the car, and any impurity M forced out through a small vent or valve in the roof. With but little low of power to the engine this process i« kept up during the entire journey." In November last a Perkins oat load of grapes' and. pesohes- was sent on 6 trial trip from San Francisco to New Orleans and back, a distance of 5,000 miles. The car was absent IB days, the thermometer on the outside of it registering from fctdeg. to 104deg., and notwith. standing that the oar was opened about thirty times during the journey the grapes and peaches when returned to San Franoisoo were as fresh as the day they were pioked, and had not lost their fl«vour. The out flowers which were also placed in the oar had lost neither their fragranoe nor their bloom during fifteen days' absenoe. The process can be applied more readily to the chambers of a steamer than to riilway o«s, ud Mr" Sinolair states that if the shipping - oompanies 'could be induced to adopt this principle, which Is muoh cheaper than refrigeration, the fruit Industry here would advanoo by leap* and bounds, and a new era of wealth to the colony would be opened. The report of Mr Sinclair on the process is obtainable on application to the Agricultural Department.