OCR Text |
Show Color Picking Of Apples Now Recommended Color picking of apples ls a common com-mon practice In Washington, Oregon Ore-gon nnd Idaho, says A. L. Stark, extension ex-tension horticulturist. Color picking pick-ing consists of removing the mast highly colored apples before the bulk of the crop is ripe. Jonathan I and delicious are the two varieties that are most often color picked. It is true that this practice neces-' neces-' siiates going over the tree a second and perhaps a third time to get all ' of the fruit but it is often profit-I profit-I able to do so because of the higher ! prices received for the earlier apples. Many Utah orchardists could profitably' take advantage of this practice. This is especially true of apple orcards on west slojes and on lighter soils or in other early situations. situ-ations. Only the full red apples should be taken in color pickings. The green fruit should be left for later pickings. Jonathan trees having a vigorous growth and a light crop seem to ripen their fruit earlier than fairly loaded trees and these trees might well be picked with the color pickings. The time to pick the bulk of the apple crop will vary with variety and season. The ease of separation of the stem from the spur is one of the best tests for picking time. As the fruit ripens it separates more readily. read-ily. Change of the green under color from a dark green to a yellowish-green or yellow is another indication indi-cation of picking maturity. Contrary to general impressions the color of seeds is not a good index of maturity. Some fruits have brown seeds long before they are ready to pick while others do not show browning in the seeds until after best picking stage has passed. The average length of growing season helps to give a general idea of order of ripening: Delicious usually usu-ally requires 142 days, Jonathan 145, Grimes 145, Ben Davis 155, and 164 days for Winesap. |